Every Angel Is Terrifying
October 9 - October 24, 2026
Opening Reception: Friday, October 9th, 6-9pm
On view: October 9 - October 24
Gallery Hours: Thursday - Saturday, 1-6pm
Every Angel Is Terrifying, a multimedia installation by Dane Manary and Shayna Strype that brings together kinetic sculptures with
projected animation, video, photography, and early optical illusions, including Pepper's Ghost, to explore what exists just beyond the edges of perception.
The exhibition takes its title from Rainer Maria Rilke's 'Duino Elegies', in which the "terrifying" angel suggests a magnitude of existence so immense that direct contact with it would exceed the limits of human understanding. Instead of looking up in terror, the work turns towards the tactile, the practical, and the miniature in an attempt to give earthly form to that which is beyond consciousness.
Drawing on the tradition of paper dollhouses as an accessible form of miniature world-building, the exhibition extends that tradition by constructing an imagined space on a life-size scale. The installation centers process, practical effects, and materiality, using an archive of objects, paper ephemera, video, and photographs to create a plane visited by angels and apparitions.
Every Angel Is Terrifying marks the artists' first installation-based collaboration, bringing together Manary's practices in photography and bookmaking with Strype's work in animation and performance.
ADDITIONAL PUBLIC PROGRAMS
Steam Works Kids Workshop - Saturday, October 17th, 1-3pm
Closing Night - Friday, October 23rd, 7-10pm
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Shayna Strype is a New York-based artist working in animation, sculpture, and puppetry performance. Her films have screened internationally, including at Slamdance Film Festival, Ann Arbor Film Festival, Anthology Film Archive, Centre de Cultura Contemporania de Barcelona, and Hiroshima Animation Season. Her work has been supported by The Jim Henson Foundation, Mono No Aware Cinema Arts Non-Profit, The Mercury Store, Mass MoCA's Assets for Artists program, and the SVA Art Practice residency. S h e is a 2026 MacDowell Fellow.
Dane Manary is a photographer, collage artist, and bookmaker based in New York City. His work has been published in the New York Times and Rangefinder Magazine. He has published books, chapbooks, and zines including Liar's Paradox (2018) Telepathy (2019) and Apophenia (2022). Не has presented work at The Bronx Documentary Center and Brooklyn Grain Studios in Greenpoint.