Tanya Merrill's latest exhibition at 303 Gallery in New York, Land animal, house animal, is built on two life-changing experiences: the artist gave birth to her daughter in June 2026, and her family relocated from New York City to upstate New York. The show runs from September 10 through October 24, 2026, at the gallery's West 21st Street space, alongside a project-room presentation by Tim Gardner.

The oil-and-graphite paintings on view respond to that new rural environment. Merrill pushes back against an anthropocentric worldview that places humans above animals, instead foregrounding the local animals she now encounters as sentient beings with their own motivations and desires. A wide-eyed, inquisitive dairy cow — A milking cow at Evelyn's dairy (2026) — stares out at the viewer; a cat appears in two works; and a Northern harrier, the marsh hawk with piercing eyes and grey, white and black feathers she watches from her studio, gets a portrait that echoes regional folk art and the tradition of Audubon. A night scene of a horse extends the bestiary.

The exhibition caps a busy year for the artist at the gallery. Merrill had previously shown in the 303 project room with What does the dog say? from April 24 to May 30, 2026, and took part in the gallery's 40th-anniversary programme in 2024. Her earlier full-scale shows at 303 included Watching women give birth on the internet and other ways of looking in 2024 and a solo in late 2021.

Read together, the current show marks a turn toward an intimate, observant naturalism — the view from a studio now surrounded by the animals it depicts, made in the months when the artist's own household grew.