“The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?” Edgar Allan Poe
Boundaries - physical or mental? Chosen or enforced? Are they used as a form of protection or as a way to keep things out, or as a social construct and how do we identify ourselves and ensure our physical and mental protection? What are the political, social, and economic definitions, and are they a necessary part of life? How are boundaries approached by different cultures and by the neurodiverse? Are the boundaries we are set by an authority set to protect or bind us? One word that has so many meanings and connotations.
This month we have had a large number of submissions, it seems to be that everyone is interested in contributing to this theme as boundaries are spaces that are crossed many times…
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Our first collection of poems, by a popular poet and writer Maggie Bowyer introduced to us by our resident poet Peter Devonald
Maggie Bowyer (they/them/theirs) is a poet, cat parent, and the author of various poetry collections including Ungodly (2022) and When I Bleed (2021). They’ve been published in Bourgeon Magazine, Capsule Stories, The Abbey Review, Troublemaker Firestarter, Wishbone Words, and more. You can find their work on Instagram and TikTok @maggie.writes.
By Peter Devonald - Maggie Bowyer is an exceptional poet who writes fearlessly and with great beauty. Their work is jaw-droppingly honest, and courageously explores chronic pain, trauma, and hidden burdens with starling clarity. I have never known anyone to write in such an unflinchingly truthful way.
Author of various poetry collections including Ungodly (2022) and When I Bleed (2021), the main focus of their writing is on Endometriosis. They have been featured in Bourgeon Magazine, Capsule Stories, Plainsongs Poetry Magazine, The Abbey Review, Troublemaker Firestarter, Wishbone Words, and more. They were the Editor-in-Chief of The Lariat Newspaper, a quarter-finalist in Brave New Voices 2016, and a Marilyn Miller Poet Laureate.
In a recent interview with Layered Onion: "While the topics I cover are dark, I try my best to leave room for hope, healing, the disabled joy, finding love amidst it all, the journey, all of it." More of their work is on Instagram @maggie.writes and http://maggiebowyer.com/quicklinks/
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An Open Letter
TW sexual violence discussed
When I was 11, my cousin’s best friend started texting me / lol and cool turned to an older teen sending me nudes / boundaries meant losing friends (and erasing myself from the family tree) / At 13, my best friend’s brother tried to shove his hand in the gap between my bra and my breast while she watched a movie in front of us / no one believes brothers are capable of brutality / it turns out honesty means losing friends since family means more than assaults no one saw / I got dumped the day I didn’t want to take my top off / the irony is he would have seen them that weekend / I got cat called more at 14 than 24; my bones don’t feel old but these dogs seem hungry for something younger than me / The last time someone threatened to follow me home I was 20 / part of me is glad it stopped happening but somehow that’s all the more threatening / My family is a church family through and through, helicopter mother and concerned extended family / none of that stopped it from happening / repeatedly / what does that say about the spaces you’re creating?
All the Places I Have Found Myself
In the kitchen, muttering over herbs and spices / In the garden, tending to seedlings to feel needed / In holding my baby brother close to my chest, feel his laughter rumble almost as though it were my own / I stumbled upon an Exile while I did the dishes dancing, tapping my feet and singing as though my mother couldn’t hear me / I brought back one Part, two Parts, every Part I found I invited to come back to center / I found myself in the gentle rinsing of grime off Parts, tending to them as though they were kittens abandoned on my doorstep / In cooking a tray of chicken for the strays, pinching this spice and that herb until the kitchen was as fragrant as my garden / I found myself at home, carrying wood to the fire burning stove, humming while wiping away filth, in the reflection of my cat's eyes, in all strays that find their way back here.
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Artist name. - Matthew Tett
Instagram link @creativeinboa
Abstract
This is a short story about a girl crossing boundaries, and visiting a place she shouldn't.
Keep Out
Darcy rattled the gate, knowing it wouldn’t give. She had rust fragments on her fingers. Rust dust, she thought. To double-check, she shook the padlock again, hoping it would budge. Nothing – just a clang, a gusty, damp breeze on her face, and a distant cacophony of some bird.
Not one to be deterred, Darcy looked both ways along the fence. It had gotten so overgrown since last time: determined green vines had twisted around fence posts, and brambles had become thick, impenetrable – she noticed such things. She could scale the gate, maybe, but that would involve risking being impaled on a nasty-looking spike, also very rusty, and no matter how desperate she was, she knew it wasn’t worth the risk. Abby, her step-mum, would tear a strip off her if she got home with her shirt torn, with anything that involved more than ‘routine maintenance’ (her words), and Darcy couldn’t be doing that, especially not after the day she had had. Before, she’d been slim enough – ‘a slight, wee thing,’ her granny said – to squeeze through the gap, ignoring the fat-bodied, bulging spiders, and the prickly thorns.
Darcy moved down the side of the fence. She left her bag on the ground, didn’t want to hitch the patchwork smiley face, or the teddy keyring – her talisman. Anyway, no one came here, particularly not in the deep, dark depths of a February afternoon, when TVs flickered behind steamy glass-windowed sitting rooms when old people dozed, mouths agape, in frayed, smelling-of-smoke armchairs, like grannies.
She could feel the chill in the air, different from when school finished just half an hour before. Then, the fresh air had been so delicious, so welcome, cooling, after a double period in Mrs. Harrison’s lab – it was stuffy, and smelled of dead things, and weird substances that Darcy didn’t understand.
All along the fence were red and white ‘Keep Out!’ signs. Clear to read, but splattered in places, with lurid purple bird shit (a diet of blackberries, Darcy knew). Some were cracked, splintered, and hanging loose. Darcy squashed her way through the undergrowth, and finally, there it was. Despite nature’s determination to keep people out, there was a way in; she’d found it.
The fence had been bent back, distorted; Darcy suspected the council couldn’t be bothered to do anything about it – or they didn’t know. There were bigger things to worry about, like the crime that Abby said was ‘rampant all over the town, people doing what they want, when they want, the cheeky so-and-sos.’ Darcy went along with it, and never had the wherewithal to ask questions. That would show Abby that she cared, and she didn’t, not really, not when she could escape beyond the ‘Keep Out!’ signs and explore somewhere new.
Darcy battled on through the bent fence and found herself in what seemed like a different world. She thought how a metal fence, with what looked like thin strands crisscrossed all over, could hold people back – some people, anyway. She looked back out the way she had come, realising that in a few steps she had changed, like the outside passageway at granny’s – all cold and dank – and then into the over-heated front room. Two different worlds.
She tip-toed along, became quickly numb to what might be underfoot, and was pleased it wasn’t a blazing-hot summer’s day when adders might be basking on rocks. Not that she could see anything, other than weeds. She’d thought ahead to suitable footwear – knew that her clumpy boots (just within the school uniform dress code) would be better than her flats. She could see the building, then, squat in the corner of the wasteland, roof tiles missing, like gaping, rotten holes – and jagged, smashed windows.
She swiped her tangled hair off her face, and felt it stick to her skin; despite the cold, the exertion made her sweat. And then, she was there, right where she wanted to be, and she knew that whatever happened, whatever came next, was worth the rust, the laddered tights. She hoped it would be worth it, anyway.
Just a few more steps and she’d know.
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Artist - BOUGE Alexandra
website - http://alexandrabouge.tumblr.com/
Article/Essay Title
UNTITLED - Translator from french to English : CORALIE BOSCO
Abstract
My poems speak of immigration, of exile. Translator from french to English : CORALIE BOSCO
a song in which her face appears / shows trough in the middle of the pictures / the child made her first sounds, (syllables), burns her last candle in a breath, a love breath / “she gave you her breath” / her breath that follows me for all my life / such a lovely laugh, a rare intelligence / I tie myself to the birds / to the woman / I tie myself to these people who emigrate from one end of the planet to another one, may their song be eternal, may their life rest in peace / the human being manages to walk barely to reach the end, the light / exceptional, exceptional / the priest consecrated the ceremony, “for you Micaela”, the baptism, the faith / “a rich woman who remains in you”, the breath breathes out in my back »
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Naomi Rado lives and works as a freelance writer and curator in Frankfurt/Main. She completed her bachelor's degree in Art History with a thesis on El Lissitzky and is currently in the final stages of a master's degree in Aesthetics at Goethe-University Frankfurt. Her scholarly focus includes the intersection between avant-garde movements and Marxist approaches to art theory, as well as contemporary forms of political art. Working simultaneously as an author and curator, her practice is based within the fluid field of artistic research.
@zvow_ (https://instagram.com/zvow_) and @mathiasweinfurter (https://instagram.com/mathiasweinfurter)
The ideological rechaining of freedom (on the work series P.P. by Mathias Weinfurter)
Naomi Rado
Mathias Weinfurter borrows the title of his series of works P.P. from an everyday symbol of Italian- speaking areas. The abbreviation P.P. (proprietà privata) can be found on curbs, monuments, walls, gates and facades. Although P.P. does not refer to the initials of one specific person, it emphatically designates the property claims of individuals. Because written out, P.P. unmistakably indicates private property. Similar to a nameplate on the cover of a book or on the door of an apartment, the stamp-like marking of space depries it of its common, i.e. public use. The symbolic pinning of a plaque, the set up of a sign, or the sealing off of areas with bars and chains, are synonymous with categorically criminalizing warnings to the unauthorized use of places marked as private - despite the type of their use. Markings in spatial surroundings are not singularly conveyed in written form: often they are in the form of design. The design could be just subtle gestures that only reveal the repressive character of their surroundings upon closer analysis. It should also be noted that the violence of P.P. style places often cannot merely be determined by their design. It should rather be sought in the discrepancy between the design of a publicly declared domain and a privately declared domain. The physical barriers or borders, can often be deceitful in their message. The barriers often appear hypocritically neutral, almost as if they had to keep their blockade function a secret. Spatial markings can be as subtle as chains and fences. Their filigree metal ramifications and eyelets may be “just metal”, however they materialize as physical interventions in space. The evaluation of spatial markings becomes even more difficult when they are completely dematerialized existing as mental constructs that nevertheless adhere to the existing order, and participate in it. Mental constructs seem as if the actual is always only the known, hardly the possible, always rigid and hardly fluid. Space, in its general category as the physical reality surrounding us, therefore has a significant role in the creation and retraction of freedom. Weinfurter’s aesthetic examination in his series of works P.P., inspects the tension between space, its restriction and its appropriation. Starting with the realization that space does exist as a form of private property, the artist subjects this status of ownership, which is measured as fragile, in constant critical scrutiny. Playfully, Weinfurter repeatedly poses the question of the validity and legitimacy of the boundaries of public and publicly accessible spaces, while referring throughout to the variable, even ephemeral aspect of spatiality.
The focal point of his practice, however, is not the taking of private property, such as the removal of chains, but the “as if”. Weinfurter moves barriers into new contexts that make them obsolete according to their former use. In doing so, he not only deprives the chains of their original function, but also addresses the redundancy of their fundamental meaning. The work P.P., conceived as a series of installations, has been developed by the artist since 2017 and revised ever since. Weinfurter thereby continues the processuality of his works both on the level of content and form. If, for example, his installation in the Opelvillen Rüsselsheim from 2018 (fig. 1-2) still shows its close reference to public spaces with the examination of chains as barriers, his constructions from 2019, which were shown mostly in white cubes, abstract the function of the chain, not because of the different exhibition situation, but in synergy to their form and materiality. In a way, one could say that his outdoor works and those in closed spaces develop two different tendencies from the same premise. The chains that the artist installs outdoors, seek to establish a connection with nature. By gently wrapping them in trees, Weinfurter reveals the fetish character attached to the chain. In the public space, it seems to fit into its surroundings without violence as a supposedly natural element of an urban infrastructure. It is not questioned why the chain - as a barrier - holds its unchallenged place within the social structure, nor are its conditions of production reflected upon - an industrial product artificially created - and, according to the idea, human-made. No matter how rational the chain may seem, it only attains meaning through its ideological setting. The exaggeration that Weinfurter works with is quite humorous. Mostly the chains in his works are taken from the publicly accessible spaces. It is the barriers to entrances, courtyards and pathways that block off spatial permeability and freedom of movement in these spaces. Weinfurter hereby symbolically frees the space from its chain, reevaluates it, and designs new proposals for its use. Mathias Weinfurter comments on his practice: “Anyone can hang anything in a public space, but it is up to the creatives to take that something away again and redesign it.” Nevertheless, he is less concerned with actual expropriation than with the question of property claims and the possibilities of spatial redistribution. In this way, the artist operates in a field of discourse that corresponds closely with current social hegemonial structures.
The playful strategy of un- or re-purposing public objects naively, but above all hopefully asks about the political function of exclusion. In fact, one would like to ask what damage would be done to space if it were not used exclusively - the arguments would be made with abrasion, vandalism, and other phantasms that deny access to all those who would supposedly want to participate in such spaces unjustly. The literal and metaphorical commentary of spatial distribution connects to an amount of pressing issues: expropriation efforts, migration policies, violations of fundamental rights. Space is a category to fight over in today’s political landscape. For about a decade now, critical theorists in architecture, geography, and urban planning have subsumed the concept of hostile architecture to include not only decidedly infrastructural exclusion, but also defensive design elements of spaces declared as public (and yet closed o).1 Empty spaces and gaps in underpasses are provided with spikes that make it impossible to find shelter in them. Cold, metal benches in urban parks are by no means inviting to rest, as they are strictly divided into individual seats and thus prevent lying on them.2 Urban space is hardly characterized by the presence of the commandment; on the contrary, at almost every corner one finds the most diverse exhortations as to what actions are to be refrained from, what is not permitted, and ultimately what consequences the non-observance of these rules entails. It even seems as if every little piece of space that has the potential to form free space (or a space of freedom) is intentionally stripped of its hypothetical function. Such repressive architectures extend over most of the public space. Even Foucault’s analysis of centralized authority, which found its architectural peak in the panopticon, is no longer limited to prisons and administrative complexes of the state apparatus3, but continues deviously in the construction of residential architecture. Large-scale housing estates, with courtyards centered inside the complexes, do not arbitrarily resemble penal institutions. Architecture, especially public architecture, is always an expression of the political agenda of those in power in their time. Even what is discussed under the concept of (urban) security4 and across state borders, is by no means free of conflict. Urban planning exemplifies a dialectic of exclusion that propagates protection but relies on the fear of defenselessness, and speculative mistrust in a precarious crisis society. Security, many government leaders agree, can only be guaranteed through total surveillance.5 The restrictions on freedom that accompany such surveillance societies6, should not to be perceived as a burden but as a compromise. Surveillance society is in favor of individual security for the privileged, but not for the protection of society as a whole. The question of the use of space thus fits into the capitalist logic of exploitation that is characteristic for contemporary societies.
So, even if Weinfurter’s net-like chain objects at first glance appear to be formalist aestheticizations of the snatched goods, that boldly undermine function in their production aesthetics, they also convey through form the tragic essence of repressive infrastructures. Weinfurter’s expansive constructions are often dominant in their effect, even daunting. Even though the artist invites the audience to cross the aesthetic boundary. Thus, the haptic aspect, such as touching, is laid out as a participatory moment in the works. The vanishing distance between the work and the viewers thus idealistically thematizes and mirrors what is taken away through privatization and is finally reclaimed through the artistic staging. In Weinfurter’s works, the motif of the chain crystallizes into an ambivalence that limits and at the same time enables passage. While the art object is suitable for leaning against during taking a selfie in the gallery space, it is not at all comfortable. For the chain remains the symbolic blockage not intended for use. And yet the cold, heavy metal, sharp-edged by the bolt cutter and with a patina of weathering, so finely chained together, has yet another completely different part to it. Especially so, when the artist sets his chains in motion. Weinfurter’s works float above the ground, slowly settle down and expand on the floor. A weight one would not want to lie under, and yet they seem so supple. Weinfurter occupies the objects with new meaning: emptied of and liberated from their function, they become an objet trouvé, which for the sake of its own sphere, as art, has an existence apart from the social and yet refers to the conditions, the history of its production. For the material appropriation of the work of art follows other principles than those of society. While Weinfurter’s chains may seem hostile and archaic at first, they take on a contrary character through the context of their exposure and the change of perspective. They are reclaimed and reinterpreted. As an exaggeration of social phenomena, Weinfurter’s art offers itself not a solution but a contribution to the discussion. In this sense, one could not only read his minimalist sculptural works as an offer but connect them to the most famous quote of left-theoretical history: “The proletarians have nothing [...] to lose but their chains. They have a world to gain.”7
(Notes)
1 On the topic of hostile architecture see also: Hu, Winnie: ‘Hostile Architecture’: How Public Spaces Keep the Public Out, in: New York Times, URL: www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/nyregion/ hostile-architecture-nyc.html; McFadden, Christo- pher: 5 Examples of ‚Anti-Homeless‘ Hostile Archi- tecture That You Probably Never Noticed Before, in: Interesting Engineering Online, URL: https://interestingengineering.com/15-exam- ples-of-anti-homeless-hostile-architecture-that- you-probably-never-noticed-before
2 Cf. Wölfl, Lisa: Wieso Parkbänke so verdammt ungemütlich sind, in: Moment. Podcast (Webseite), URL: www.moment.at/story/wieso-parkbaenke- so-verdammt-ungemuetlich-sind
3 Referring to Michel Foucault‘s Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (1975)
4 See examplary: Floeting, Holger: „Es muss etwas passieren“ — (Un-)Sicherheit und Stadtentwicklung, in: Forum Kriminalprävention (4/2013), p. 8-14.
5 See also Website of Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung: Denninger, Erhard: Freiheit gegen Sicherheit?, URL: www.bpb.de/dialog/netzdebatte/ 243992/ freiheit-gegen-sicherheit; Endreß, Christian and Nils Petersen: Die Dimensionen des Sicherheitsbegriffs, URL: www.bpb.de/politik/innenpolitik/innere-sicher- heit/76634/dimensionen-des-sicherheitsbegriffs
6 The term surveillance society refers to forms of society that are particularly characterized by surveillance. This can be, for example, by wide spread video recording, but also by other mechanisms of surveillance, such as the social control of citizens among themselves and by the state, the storage of personal data or the use of facial recognition software in public places. See exemplary the recently published anthology: Zappe, Florian; Gross, Andrew S. (Eds.): Surveillance, Society, Culture, Berlin, 2020.
7Engels, Friedrich and Karl Marx: Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei (cited here from the 56th Edition of 1989, Dietz Verlag Berlin), p. 83.
Archive I documents selected projects by Mathias Weinfurter from recent years. The publication features four thematic booklets, each on one of the artist's work series. Each of the four booklets contains an extensive photo documentation and an accompanying text by a different author. ARCHIVE I was developed and designed by graphic designer Anne Krieger. (IG: @annekriii / https://www.instagram.com/annekriii/) and also features texts by Elena Frickmann (IG: elenafrck / https://instagram.com/elenafrck), Nils Altland (IG: @nilli_vanilly / https://instagram.com/nilli_vanilly) and Marc Ries (IG: @marcries3971 / https://instagram.com/marcries3971)
The publication can be ordered via the artist here: http://mathiasweinfurter.de/archive-1-de-2/
All pictures of Mathias' works on the haus_a_rest website are photographed by Stephan Idé (IG: @stephan_ide / https://instagram.com/stephan_ide)