BCMT Gallery: The Alchemy of Opposites

The Hudson Valley does something to you. The light sharpens, the air turns almost crystalline, and the land hums with its own frequency. Here, bridges rise like sculpture over the Hudson River, and the forest feels like a cathedral — all vaulted canopy and filtered gold. It’s a place that draws you in quietly, then keeps you.

For Joshua Vogel, the pull was immediate. Raised in New Mexico under a vast, cinematic sky, he grew up surrounded by land that taught patience and scale. “If you’re a woodworker, the forest is the source,” he says. “You’re living in the source.” He wanted to be in the dirt, to fish the rivers, to wake up inside the materials he worked with.

“If you’re a woodworker, the forest is the source. You’re living in the source.” — Joshua Vogel

Kelly Zaneto’s journey was more of a slow burn. A Jersey girl with an instinct for style and a radar for authenticity, she had lived many lives before finding her way north. “I’m not an artist,” she says, “but I’m a deep-feeler. No words necessary. I always knew I wanted to support artists — that’s my calling. You don’t always see the path while you’re on it, but when you look back, it’s clear.” She found instant kinship with the region’s energy healers and empaths — the quiet network that stitches together much of Hudson Valley life.

“You don’t always see the path while you’re on it, but when you look back, it’s clear.” — Kelly Zaneto

When they finally settled here, it wasn’t just to live — it was to create a life entirely their own. They made a home, raised their daughter, and built a rhythm that blurred the lines between art and living. Out of that rhythm came BCMT Gallery— part showroom, part sanctuary, all soul.

The Feeling Inside BCMT

The first thing you notice when you walk through its doors isn’t the furniture, or the sculpture, or even the light. It’s the feeling. Somewhere out of sight, a candle burns, its warm, resinous scent curling through the air. It feels like home — not the rushed, messy kind, but the kind you dream of, where you’re seen and held. The atmosphere is quiet but charged, as if the room itself is holding its breath. A table in the corner has been chamfered so softly it dissolves into shadow; nearby, a willow vessel leans into its curve like a dancer mid-bow.

“[The Gallery] feels like home — not the rushed, messy kind, but the kind you dream of, where you’re seen and held.”

Josh is the maker, drawn to the elemental — wood, stone, metal — with a mind that pares form down to its essence. Kelly is the curator, led by a near-telepathic intuition, tuning the space like a conductor coaxing an orchestra into harmony. Together, they are opposites in temperament and even astrology, yet perfectly in balance. “I feel supported by Kelly and propelled,” Josh says. “We built this from nothing.”

The Snake and the Sign

BCMT didn’t start with a business plan. It started with a need — and a sign. For nearly a decade, Josh and Kelly had kept a series of showrooms alongside his Blackcreek Mercantile & Trading Co. workshop in Kingston. Visitors would drift in, intoxicated by the scent of oiled wood and the sight of human hands coaxing raw material into form, and be led by Kelly to a space where the finished work waited. It wasn’t about rapid sales; it was about understanding. About craft. About slowing down enough to see.

“Every fiber of my being knew. This was the space.” — Kelly Zaneto

When COVID stilled the world, Josh returned to sculpture in stone and wood — work that needed a different kind of home. Kelly knew it, too. “We realized we needed an incubator for sculpture and furniture,” she says. “But we also knew it couldn’t be just us.”

The morning she was set to look at a potential space, Kelly saw a snake. “I’m very totem-oriented,” she says. “Snakes are transformation.” Later that day, her realtor led her into the old Daily Freeman newspaper building. The second she crossed the threshold, her whole body said yes. “Every fiber of my being knew. This was the space.”

A Philosophy of Essence

Josh’s work always begins with a question: What does the material want to be? His answers are deceptively simple — a bowl, a spoon, a table — but transformed into something that feels inevitable. “A spoon is ubiquitous,” he says. “You can’t live without it. The challenge is to make something functional, also feel essential — to give it a soul.”

His influences range from Pacific Northwest Native American sculpture to the meditative, sculptural possibilities of woodturning. He finds kinship with the Amish woodworkers nearby, whose ethos mirrors his own: intentional, resourceful, rooted in craft. As a maker of functional art, he’s also drawn to the bridges that span the Hudson. “Of course,” he smiles, “as a builder, you notice them. The ones here are works of art.”

“A spoon is ubiquitous. You can’t live without it. The challenge is to make something functional, also feel essential — to give it a soul.” — Joshua Vogel

Kelly’s curatorial process is equally elemental. She doesn’t read pitches or look at slideshows. She stands in front of the work and listens. “It’s physical,” she says. “I feel it in my body. I call it my octaves — a full-body frequency that tells me when something belongs.” The pieces she selects don’t shout. They hum.

The Collective

BCMT isn’t a revolving door of shows. It’s a permanent collective — a core group of artists united by a shared reverence for nature, material, and the human hand.

There’s Kat Howard, whose textile-based sculptures — bound rope, muslin, and cotton — seem to breathe in the space, holding memory and healing in their fibers. Sue Kirk weaves willow vessels from organically grown willow in the UK, each carrying both function and sculptural grace, its surface painted by nature’s own palette. Samuel Aguirre shapes furniture and objects from rope, wicker, and other plant fibers, twisting and arcing like drawings in three dimensions, bridging traditional craft with contemporary form. Ellis Dulchin, a Brooklyn-based glass artist, began as a teenager at Urban Glass and has since woven his love for Venetian goblet-making with experimental materials. His glass-and-metal objects, both functional and sculptural, invite touch and daily interaction, making art a part of life.

And then there’s Joshua Vogel, working in wood, stone, and metal — his vessels and sculptures anchoring the room. Together, these works converse — a hum of clay, willow, steel, glass, and linen — each piece tuned to the next.

“We don’t want the artists to worry about selling. They should be focused on making. That’s what we’re here for — to hold space for that.” — Kelly Zaneto

Kelly sees the gallery as a hive. “Artists come in, recharge, and go back out into the world more full,” she says. Her role, as she sees it, is protection. “We don’t want the artists to worry about selling. They should be focused on making. That’s what we’re here for — to hold space for that.”

Resisting the Noise

In a world where money often shouts the loudest, BCMT is a quiet act of defiance. “You can’t scale a business like this unless you’re willing to mass-produce,” Kelly says. “We’re not. That’s not the point. This is about soul. Intention. Human hands. Magic.”

Josh nods. “We’re fighting to preserve the soul of things. The world pushes money as the guiding light — but we’re trying to live by the creative spirit.”

That spirit shapes everything — from pricing (fair, but sustainable) to pace (seasonal, not frantic). There are artist talks, special shows, intimate gatherings, but no chase for churn or optics. The gallery bends to the artist’s rhythm, not the other way around.

“We’re fighting to preserve the soul of things. The world pushes money as the guiding light — but we’re trying to live by the creative spirit.” — Joshua Vogel

Beyond the Gallery

Their life in the Hudson Valley mirrors their work — deliberate, soulful, and rooted. Their daughter is homeschooled, her days a tapestry of horseback riding, French lessons, sewing, and song. In their backyard, Josh built a cedar bathhouse and wood-fired sauna — their daily ritual, used more than any restaurant. “It’s our reset,” Kelly says. “We’re not weekend warriors. We don’t make plans. We make space.”

When they travel, they choose places with soul. In Mexico, Josh rises early to build intricate sand sculptures, knowing the tide will claim them by afternoon. “It’s the joy of making without holding on,” he says.

“The land here isn’t a backdrop; it’s a collaborator.” — Joshua Vogel

At home, they walk the paths at Olana, study the sweep of bridges over the Hudson, and visit Storm King. The land here isn’t a backdrop; it’s a collaborator. “You look out over the valley from up high and think — of course we’d settle here,” Josh says. “You feel it in your bones. It’s ancestral.”

“A reminder that opposites attract and beauty, like love, is built to last.”

BCMT Gallery isn’t just a space. It’s a living argument for the value of human hands, the patience of craft, and the alchemy that happens when two opposites — a New Mexico-born builder of elemental forms and a Jersey-born curator with a sixth sense for beauty — work in concert. It’s a place that hums — with history, with care, with the rare courage to slow down. And when you walk in, you feel it immediately: a quiet that holds you. A reminder that opposites attract and beauty, like love, is built to last.

Photos courtesy of BCMT Gallery

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