Soft Boundery
April 14 - 27, 2022
Pfizer Building first floor, 630 Flushing Ave, Brooklyn, NY, 11206
Artists: Noémie Jennifer Bonnet, Utsa Hazarika, Christopher Lin, Naomi Nakazato, Steven Uccello
Curated by Wanhang Chao, Tzu-Ying Naomi Chan, Yindi Chen, Eunice Chen, Virginia Ingram, Kyungah Lee, Uttara Parekh, Sophia Park, and Caroline Taylor Shehan
Instructor: Noam Segal
“Elements by themselves probably never cause anything.”
—Jane Bennett, Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things
When boundaries are softened, disparate elements are able to gather as an assemblage, and we find that they accrue dynamic power and sustain life. The artworks in Soft Boundary come together to form a constellation of diverse materiality. Ranging from conventional art materials to organic elements like moss, bone, and branches, the physical form of these works embraces a blurring of boundaries between the natural and the human made. Beyond their materiality, the works’ conceptual underpinnings speak to a softening of boundaries between the structures that organize our reality. These structures include the natural environment and the built environment, the spiritual and digital worlds, and our understanding of time and of the self.
In analyzing and presenting the works of Noémie Jennifer Bonnet, Utsa Hazarika, Christopher Lin, Naomi Nakazato, and Steven Uccello, we propose distortion as a mechanism to soften the boundaries between these structures and reveal their entanglements. Distortion is typically conceived as movement that triggers error, but perhaps it can inspire radical transgression.
Soft Boundary encourages visitors to perceive entanglements as transformative encounters and distortion as a curious yet generative mechanism for deconstructing edges that limit us. If we can embrace distortion, perhaps we can experience change with more grace and resilience.
