worthless studios

Welcome Laila Annmarie Stevens, , our July Photographer in Residence in Brooklyn, NY. 

During her time in residence, Laila will continue her multimedia portrait project ZAMI of Black Caribbean le****ns and q***r women in NYC,  inspired by Audre Lorde’s 1982 biomythography Zami: A New Spelling of My Name. Lorde defines “zami” as a Carriacou term for “women who work together as lovers and friends.” 

Through archival video, sound collage, and photographic images, ZAMI is both a coming-of-age homage and a love quilt dedicated to community as a foundation for self-discovery, expression, and collective care.
Since being published in The New York Times Metropolitan Section at just 20 years old, Stevens has appeared in National Geographic, The Guardian US, The Nation, Cultured Magazine, The Gothamist, and more. She is a 2025 NYSCA Grantee, 2025–2026 Curve Foundation Fellow, Fall 2025 Artist-in-Residence at Yaddo, a 2023–2024 Magnum Foundation NYC Fellow, and a graduate of the Eddie Adams Workshop Class of # # .
Her infamous series, Clayton Sisterhood Project, received a full spread in the 25th anniversary edition of Reflections in Black by Dr. Deborah Willis, Reflections in Black: A Reframing (2025). The work was also selected as a 2024 Aperture Portfolio Prize Runner-Up and received the Rising Voice Grant through PhotoVogue’s 2025 “Women by Women.” Her Guardian US assignment on Black People Will Swim was honored in The Guardian US’s Best Photos of 2024. 

1. Laila Ann Marie Stevens by Amber N. Ford, .ford
2. Laila Ann Marie Stevens, Keamber (Mirror Reflection), from ZAMI, 2022.  
3. Laila Ann Marie Stevens, Toni & Drew (Hand to Chest), ZAMI, 2022.  
4. Laila Ann Marie Stevens, MARZ, from ZAMI, 2022.  
5. Laila Ann Marie Stevens, The Deepest Water Bearer Frederiksted, U.S.V.I./St. Croix, from ZAMI, 2024.  
6. Laila Ann Marie Stevens, MARZ (Birds), from ZAMI, 2022.

As part of our Photographer in Residence program, artists get two sessions of scanning and printing at Brooklyn Printworks, . Helena Goñi, , joined Ken at the Brooklyn Printworks printing studio to create high-res scans of work and large prints of work made during her residency in the Airstream darkroom. 🎞️🖨️

Our partnership with Brooklyn Printworks on two workshops for photographers after their time in the Airstream has added a professional development component to the residency, enabling us to provide more support to the artists, plus two amazing prints for free. Thank you, Brooklyn Printworks, for this partnership and all your knowledge!

For more information about Photographer in Residence, visit the link in our bio. 🔗

We’re excited to present Alix Vernet , as one of the shortlisted artists for WARP 2026! We received an overwhelming response to the 2026 WARP Open Call, reaffirming the urgent need for sculpture-focused residency programs in New York. 💥

From an exceptional pool of applicants, 4 artists have been shortlisted for WARP 2026. The artists are Patricia Ayres , Abigail DeVille , Andrew Ross , and Alix Vernet . We’ll announce the selected artist soon.

Today, we are highlighting Alix Vernet . Vernet received an MFA from Yale University and a BA from the University of California, Los Angeles. She has had solo exhibitions at Helena Anrather, Museion, Anton Kern, Francois Ghebaly, Gund Gallery, Jeffrey Deitch, and Soft Opening. In her practice, sculpture is an active, participatory process rooted in direct contact with architecture and the people who inhabit, maintain, and reshape it.

WARP was created by WORTHLESSSTUDIOS in partnership with to address a major gap in the arts ecosystem by giving artists access not only to funding, but to the technical resources, infrastructure, and institutional support necessary to realize complex, large-scale sculptural work. 

1. Alix Vernet by Olive Parker. 
2. CROWDS, After N.H Pritchard “crowds” from EECCHHOOEESS, 1971, 2023 Glazed stoneware Letters from facade of Brooklyn Public Library, Grand Army Plaza 144 x 138 in.
3. Street Casts, 2023, Installation View.
4. Mirror, After Sari Dienes ‘Sleep Lovely Babe’, 1954, 2026 aluminum foil 26 3/4 x 17 1/2 x 3 in.