(Bad boundaries) expected lines misbehaving
(Bad boundaries) pushing through cracks becoming
(Bad boundaries) portals instead of fixed points
(Bad boundaries) solids becoming spills
(Bad boundaries) it’s tautness revisited
(Bad boundaries) making a problem of being contained
(Bad boundaries) confusing should and won’t, can and don’t

Catinca Tabacaru Gallery presents Bad Boundaries, a solo exhibition by Tennessee artist Serra Victoria Bothwell Fels, on view November 16 – December 22, 2018. This will be the artist’s second solo exhibition with the Gallery.

Bothwell Fels uses principles of magical realism as sculptural directives, fading regular, mundane places into possibilities both dystopic and hopeful––a sense that there is something beyond the physical structures of our everyday environments. One could say that Bothwell Fels actively courts bad boundaries. It’s a rogue approach that gets soupy and stretchy, messy and compiled. There’s an implication of expected action that fails to appear. Or an assumption that there should be nothing where there is something.

Bad boundaries: are happening in ways that anger me.
Bad boundaries: are happening in ways that hearten me.

In a time when extreme boundaries are being drawn, we at Catinca Tabacaru Gallery are looking to make spaces that court an openness to what’s beyond ourselves, to realities outside our expectations.

How do we muddy these waters? Or clear up the silt blocking our view?