At the Edge, on view at John William Gallery in Wilmington as part of a collaboration between the Wendell Castle Workshop, HB381 Gallery, and the Wilmington Film Festival, includes photographs by filmmaker Matt Kresling and the Danish artists and furniture designers Mette Bentzen and Lasse Kristensen, also known as Egevaerk. The artists photographed natural formations found in both Scandinavia and the Great Lakes region near the workshop for inspiration and with Kresling created the documentary Path about their work and the residency. The works created at the Wendell Castle Workshop were on view at HB381 in NYC over the summer.

Tonight, 10/7/26, is the opening reception for the exhibition, with a screening of Path at 6pm. The exhibition will be on view until 10/11/26.

More from the gallery and Project Director Kathrine Page:

…The residency became a critical exploration of the deep geographical and cultural connection between the two continents. Working along the shores of Lake Ontario, the artists searched for stones that embodies qualities central to their practice: a reverence for nature in transformation, an awareness of water’s ancient and shaping force, and an appreciation for the mystery and paradox inherent in the sea. They ultimately selected rocks whose fluid contours revealed the incremental effects of tides and whose visible strata suggested the slow thaw of a disintegrating glacier. Inspired by these specimens, they created two large-scale, stack-laminated, hand-carved sculptural furniture works, measuring four and five feet in height.

This exhibition of photographs documenting the residency draws on a visual language shaped by an aesthetic connection to glacial formations and landscapes of confluence and exchange. It explores emotional intersections and celebrates the threshold where atmosphere and materiality meet. The photographs reflect shared characteristics of the landscapes of Denmark and the Great Lakes region, while highlighting the creativity that emerges from this geographical kinship.

At the Edge also celebrates the role of intuition as a catalyst for artistic discovery and breakthrough. At its heart, the exhibition offers a meditation on the collaborative residency that brought together furniture designers and filmmakers in an exploration of landscape, material. memory, and place.

Accompanying the exhibition at the Wilmington Film Festival is the documentary film, Path, by Matt Kresling in partnership with Nordic filmmakers in Denmark. Path documents the design team Egevaerk’s journey from Denmark to their five-week residency of artistic discovery in Rochester, NY where they designed, built, and crafted sculptures in the workshop of the late legendary artist Wendell Castle. Far from the Danish traditions and expectations that had shaped their craft to this point, they set out to find their own path. This is a film about craftsmanship and the courage to break with the familiar forces of nature- far greater than us all.