Are we complicit in the violence that surrounds us? While often practical or necessary, how does security’s growing presence affect the ways we experience one another? In an effort to recognize our assumptions and better see the webs we weave, Karen Fitzgerald raises questions like these through her work made from stuff from our everyday lives. Through the context of these materials—their purpose and place in our lives—she explores inherent values and meanings, fascinated by the intricacies of our relationships as well as the contradictions that often dictate the ways we move around in the world.

In practice, this involves breaking down materials from books to discarded clothing, seeking out color and shape, and building them into structural collages. Preserved with resin, Fitzgerald’s work takes on a jewel-like finish, highlighting the beauty and mystery of the conversation it aims to create.