In the wide, light-filled studio in Chatham, where Deborah Masters built her monumental sculptures, something new is taking shape. The work is still here—drawings, works on paper, and large-scale pieces that carry the physical confidence Masters was known for—but so is a living, expanding community of artists who once orbited her, learned from her, or were championed by her. This spring and summer, the Deborah Masters Studio becomes not just a site of remembrance, but a place of continued exchange.
After Masters’ death in December, her husband, Geoff Wilcox, made a decision that felt instinctive. Rather than treat the studio as a static archive, he chose to open it outward. What began as a retrospective has evolved into a series of exhibitions that bring other artists into the space—many of them people Masters supported, collected, or stayed in touch with over decades. “We have Deborah, we have her work, we have her legacy,” Wilcox says. “Then we have this group of people around her—the friends of Deborah Masters. And we have this effort to expand the community even further.”
That idea shaped last year’s exhibitions, which felt to many participants like a Brooklyn group show relocated upstate: artists who once showed together in the city reconnecting after years of dispersal. This year, the studio is taking another step forward by inviting guest curators—artists themselves—to organize the shows with an open, democratic spirit. The series is titled “Shifted Ground: Reflections on a Changing Landscape.”
The first of those curators is Sasha Chermayeff, who has known Masters since the mid-1980s. “Debbie didn’t just make work,” Chermayeff says. “She collected people.” The initial group exhibitions reflected that history, drawing from artists Masters had supported across generations and geographies. This season widens the lens: artists from last year inviting others they’re currently working alongside—many of them younger, local, or newly arrived in the region.
Curating, in this context, is less about selection than invitation. Artists are asked what they want to show: recent work, studies, pieces that never quite found a home elsewhere. “It’s more about organizing and hanging a strong show,” Chermayeff explains, “not telling someone they don’t fit.”
That openness reflects the way Masters herself moved through the art world. Known for her directness, toughness, and dry humor, she was also a fierce advocate—particularly for women artists—who demonstrated that scale, ambition, and generosity could coexist. Her studio, roughly 5,000 square feet, still carries that physical imprint. Large sculptures share space with intimate works on paper, and movable walls allow each exhibition to reshape the room without erasing its history.
Alongside the exhibitions, Wilcox has been organizing informal studio visits among participating artists, extending the sense of connection beyond the gallery walls. “A lot of that fell away during Covid,” he says. “This has brought some of it back—artists spending time together, talking about work, enjoying each other’s company.”
The 2026 season includes three exhibitions: April 18–May 9, June 6–27 (artist Thaddeus Radell will curate that show), and August 8–29, each featuring Masters’ work alongside that of invited artists, more than 50 over the course of the series). Together, they form a portrait not just of an artist’s legacy, but of the community she helped build—and the one still growing in her wake.
In Masters’ studio, the work continues—not frozen in time, but carried forward by the people she gathered, and by those now finding their way into the circle.
Deborah Masters Studio
253 Slate Hill Road, Chatham
This article appears in April 2026.
