Our built environment is full of structures that both constrict and facilitate movement. From the architecture of public and private buildings, to city planning and subway systems, to national borders and jurisdictional limits, to the languages we speak and the ones we do not, imagined and real boundaries define and condition how we move in the world and how we interact within it.

In this exhibition, Mine and Yours: Forms of Distinction, Felix Kindermann takes up the ubiquity of fences and their social function in New York City. Observing that many fences at residences and public spaces are too short to truly prevent a persistent visitor from crossing, Kindermann posits the fence as a structure of sociality. At once, they act as symbols of class and wealth, delimit and open the space between personal and private, and elucidates who belongs in a given space—and who does not. Fences keep out, but also let in.

Kindermann’s practice has long centered the relationships between people in response to their environments, with a particular focus on themes of togetherness and separation within communities. These works consider the interhuman encounter shaped by the structure of the fence and the notion of reciprocal actions. In this exhibition, Kindermann posits new photographic and installation artworks that negotiate the complex tension between the production and possession of these social boundaries.

Open through July 7th

Goethe-Institut New York (30 Irving Place, Ground Floor)

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