Bethany Krull, “Home”, August 28 – October 31, 2026

Our Boundless, Complicated Wild

Curatorial Essay by Bethany Krull and Edward Y.J. Millar

Our relationship with the rest of the natural world is complicated, messy, and often contradictory. Even as we try to control the environment for power, profit, pleasure, or preservation, we seek separation from it. We build and maintain home spaces that physically cut us off from a world that feels increasingly less habitable. Then we try to bring pieces of that world inside through potted plants, domesticated animals, and artificial representations. We desire protection from and connection with nature. This paradox lies at the heart of Bethany Krull’s newest exhibition, Home.

Bethany Krull’s Home is an installation of ceramic and mixed-media sculptures that investigates our complex relationship with the untamed natural world and the domestic spaces we build within it. Each section of the exhibition imagines a home environment that wanders between our curated order and an ever-present wildness. Together, they invite reflection on the home as a space safe from the unpredictability of nature: a nature that inevitably takes up residence inside on its own terms.

Every tableau designed by Krull is a visual depiction of the tension between our sense of interior and exterior worlds. A living room chair sprouts grass in the echo of where someone once sat. A television lit with the crackling of wildfire flames is a portal to the volatile, unconstrained nature beyond the room. A dresser drawer shelters a litter of kittens resting in a pile of clothing. A soft, warm light shines through the honeycomb structure of a ceiling light built as a wasp creates its nest.

This blurring of boundaries between intentional objects and emergent nature reminds us of an undeniable fact: at the end of the day, we are inseparable from the natural world. The roads we drive on, cities we walk through, and homes we sleep in all exist within and are part of a wider, shared ecosystem. While this may be overlooked in our daily lives, when we are confronted with increasing natural disasters and loss of wild spaces, we are reminded of just how integrally connected and affected we are.

Beyond the visual imagery of each setting, Krull’s choice of material also reflects our longing for a relationship with nature, albeit on our own terms. Ceramic sculptures in each room provide a sense of physicality and presence. Working with clay mirrors the act of domestication: human hands molding something natural into a new version of itself. Artificial flora are manufactured to be perfect, permanent, and everlasting: the total opposite of how they exist in the wild. They do not grow, they do not drink, and they want for nothing. Nevertheless, these man-made representations appeal to us because they embody a sense of nature that we can control and make fit into our routine.

When we talk about ‘home’ in our everyday life, it is often about more than just the building or objects inside it. We think about what it represents: the sense of safety, comfort, and warmth we strive for. Bethany Krull’s Home imagines a space where the non-physical becomes physical, laid out plainly for us to see and reckon with. Each tableau is filled with flora and fauna that asks us to consider our role in the loss, decay, and destruction of the environment—even as we attempt to preserve, curate, and replicate it within our domestic settings. To feel truly home, is to acknowledge our own vulnerability: that we are forever a part of a chaotic, natural world we cannot predict or control.

Press Release available here.

Catalog available here.

August 2026 Fourth Friday photos available here. Photos by Curtis Kreutter.