The Thinning Veil
by Simon Johns, May 11, 2026
The Thinning Veil explores materiality, magnetism and the unseen geography of the Green Mountains. Outside of Burlington, the surrounding area appears frozen in time, expansive and mysterious. Vermont’s mountains and tranquil countryside prepares visitors for Kate Swanson’s curatorial approach that feels richly thematic at Nurture by Nature, her gallery situated in Burlington. Swanson leaned into the area’s mystique and folk lore when assembling the small group show that is fittingly, rooted in place, and is a great example that highly crafted design is being shown far beyond the usual major cities.
A thinning veil, in Celtic and spiritual traditions, is a time when the boundary between the physical and spiritual world is believed to be permeable. Swanson adopts this premise as a curatorial framework in order to “treat objects as talismans—grounding elements that hold energy in a room, the way granite holds charge in the earth or untouched forests hold a quiet, living presence that reshapes how we move within them.”
Among these “thin places” are the Bennington Triangle, known for unexplained disappearances; Brunswick Springs and its “regional folklore of thaw and erasure”; the Rock of Ages Quarry, imbued with a mystical charge; and the distinctive “witch window” found in Vermont’s vernacular architecture. Antique folk objects and ephemera are presented alongside contemporary design pieces to create a dialogue that attempts to collapse distinctions between past and present, artifact and object, ritual and use.
Swanson structured the exhibition in three adjoining rooms titled `The Cursed Spring’, The Liminal Forest and ‘The Conductive Core’. The lighting throughout is deliberately low, shifting the viewing experience away from singularity and toward atmosphere; like peering into a forgone parlour set but instead is the heritage-inspired Isabella Chair by Anne Greene Studio, elevated on a pedestal filled with firewood and flanked by two Canvas Sconces by KDNS Studio, which cast an atmospheric and very slowly shifting light.
In the second room, a brick wall, instead of the traditional white gallery, supports a constellation of Aydan Hüseynli’s cast aluminum Pine Replica Wall Hooks that introduce a subtle ornamental rhythm that borders on the decorative, while also nodding to natural forms. Opposite, Ford Bostwick’s 2 x 2 Chair reads less architectural than usual presentations of his work and more akin to the necessity-driven simplicity of rudimentary farm furniture.
The last space opens onto a vast tablescape of vases, table lamps, flowers, pebbles, and potted Norfolk pine trees. The composition brings to mind a literal maquette of Vermont that the show references, one of “legends and landscapes”. The Tied Vase by Elizabeth Lenny, a chain of tied small alabaster vessels each holding flowers, weaves through the display. An ethereal table lamp by Thomas Yang made with maple on a stone base is topped by a paper shade that gently sways with the airflow. Ethan Streicher’s Disc Lamp, made of glazed ceramic, conceals its light source deep within its form, evoking the sensation of peering into a small, luminous well. This tablescape embodies the metaphysical and material pairings of the natural world.
By the end of the exhibition's trajectory, it does feel like the works themselves are inhabited by something deeper than their physical presence. Perhaps the thinning veil is the permeable boundary between the material objects, the maker’s intent, their context and place. The permeability at play is not necessarily between worlds, but between object and interpretation, material and narrative, where each piece holds more than just form and function. For example, Thomas Yang’s table lamp, with its heavy base and fragile swaying shade embodies much more than its materiality. It carries in equal parts the grounding permanence of jurassic stone as it does the ephemerality of the moment.
Whether these objects function as talismans depends on who lives with them. It makes the case however, that the contemporary objects we choose, make or collect can carry something intangible within them. In a similar way that mementos and relics we hold on to carry memories and nostalgia, design can be charged with intention or have a grounding presence. How we choose to live with these surely affects our contemporary rituals. Perhaps the “veil” that is being thinned is not only between the physical and the spiritual, but between object and narrative, where meaning is negotiated, constructed, and, at times, transposed.