
It may feel illicit to do so in an art gallery, but you can touch—and sit on—Jessi Reaves’s new furniture sculptures. Some appear to have been turned inside out—take, for example, the couch made of dull yellow upholstery foam strapped to a wood armature—while others are more playful renditions of familiar design objects. A narrow plywood shelf is the “functional” part of Rules Around Here (Waterproof Shelf), zipped inside a vinyl sheath; the way the fabric tapers at the top, near the sculpture’s “neck,” and a piece of wood pokes out where shoulders would be, makes the piece look like a headless witchy figure. Also irresistible are Bitches Bonnet Seat, a low-slung chair upholstered in sheer embroidered lace, and two sly Noguchi knockoffs incorporating decidedly un-Noguchi materials like sawdust, cedar chips and Jeep Cherokee fenders. —Leigh Anne Miller
Pictured: View of Jessi Reaves’s 2016 exhibition at Bridget Donahue, New York.