The Fellowship of PAFA
Fellowship Virtual Gallery
CHRISTINA BOTHWELL
Artist Statement
I have always been drawn to the ineffable—to the meaning that lies beneath the appearance of things. In the one sense, glass is solid, heavy. But when glass is illuminated, it is transparent, fluid. For me, glass is an ideal vehicle to express the balance of life and spirit. In my work I like to explore the idea that we are more than just our physical bodies. I use glass to try and articulate what the non-physical is, that infinite quality of our spirit.
Click on each image to enlarge and view full screen mode
Bio
Christina Bothwell attended the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from 1979 until 1983 to study painting. She gradually moved to working in three dimensionally using ceramics and cast glass (as well as incorporating bits of antique toys, taxidermy, and small furniture parts). Bothwell’s pieces are ofter a union between her own mythology and lucid dreams.
Christina Bothwell has won numerous awards and grants including a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, a Virginia A. Groot Foundation award for excellence in sculpture (1st place) and a Haven Foundation Grant. In 2021, during the pandemic, Bothwell had her fourth solo exhibition at the Heller Gallery in New York, NY, titled Luminous Dreams in Cataclysmic Times. She has an upcoming exhibit of her work titled “Esprits Libres” at the Foundation Bernardaud in Limoges, France that will run from June 2022 through April 2023.
Bothwell’s work is held in permanent and public collections including the Corning Museum of Contemporary Glass, Corning, New York; The Racine Art Museum, Racine, Wisconsin; SMOG (Shanghai Museum of Glass Art) in Shanghai, China; the Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile Alabama; the Palm Springs Museum, California; the Alexander Tutsek-Stiftung Foundation, Munich, Germany; The Cincinnati Museum of Art, Cincinnati, Ohio; the Glasmuseet Ebeltoft Museum of Contemporary Glass, Denmark; the Smithsonian Archives of American Art, Oral History Collection, District of Columbia;Lowe Art Museum, Miami, Florida; the Fuller Craft Museum, Boston, Massachusetts; and the Imagine Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida.
In December, 2020, Bothwell was featured on the PBS television show, Craft in America, Storytellers Episode.
Christina Bothwell is represented by Heller Gallery, NYC; Austin Art Projects, CA; Habitat Gallery, MI; and Momentum Gallery, NC.