A window can bridge inner and outer worlds just as a screen can displace a subject into an imagined reality. In the Binghamton University Art Museum’s lower galleries, Keira Atwell ‘26 explores these psychological tensions through her exhibition “Frames Within Frames: Intimacy through Visual Exchange.”

Featuring 10 works that vary in size, medium and content, the exhibition loosely connects those tensions through framing devices such as mirrors, windows, doors, screens and wallpaper that impact how the subjects of each piece are viewed. Atwell’s goal was to make people think about the domestic and architectural barriers in art that often go unnoticed.

“A figure positioned within a doorway can signify a theme of mobility, or a figure positioned within a mirror can allude [to] themes of self contemplation,” Atwell wrote in an email. “I really wanted the viewers of my exhibition to change the way they normally look at art, and perhaps begin to notice these framing devices in their own day to day lives.”

“Frames Within Frames” sits front and center in the lower galleries, reflecting the bold, colorful pieces on display.

The “Mirrors” portion focuses on the separation of people from their reflections. Emil Ganso’s “Studio Mirror,” an engraving of a woman looking into her full-body reflection, does this through the dual perspective of her back to the viewer and her front being reflected in a full-length mirror. She isolates her face with a smaller, handheld one too, giving the impression that onlookers are intruding on an intimate moment.

This starkly contrasts Atwell’s next choice of an acrylic painting, “The Mirror” by Richard Yarde, which depicts a man getting ready to go out. Unlike the more disconnected engraving of the woman, Yarde’s subject confronts the observer despite his reflection being his only visible feature. According to Atwell’s description, the man seems to be “caught between looking inward and outward at a world he cannot physically touch.”

The next wall features both windows and doorways, the latter of which shows figures under shadowy or glowing frames, marking transitions in the subjects’ lives.

Both pieces in the “Windows” section depict their subjects looking out, whether it’s a woman viewing an urban landscape in Arne Bessner’s “The Street Below,” or a man in a theatre box in Lesser Ury’s “Man with Binoculars.” This pairing creates an apparent class distinction between the man in the theater and the woman looking out at gaudy signs for “PIZZA” and “ADULT BOOK[S].”

They contain scenes that, in many ways, oppose one another, yet connect through the divides between interior and exterior worlds — inviting viewers to observe the act of observing.

Atwell explained that while putting together her exhibition, she was determined to display pieces that would immediately catch a viewer’s eye despite their initial lack of association.

“While my big ideas and labels delve into a sort of intellectual exercise, I wanted the exhibition to be enjoyed by any kind of visitor,” Atwell wrote. “Some people come into museums not wanting to read labels and wanting to make their own inferences about the displayed artwork, and so I did my best to find pieces that were as visually stimulating [as] they were psychologically rich.”

Her focus on striking pieces is most prominent in the “Screens” section, which contains May Stevens’ “Living Room” — an oil painting of two moody, seated figures who are divided by a screen capturing a stereotypical nuclear family. The painting’s sense of isolation and domestic tension is heightened by the cheerful family scene behind them. The room is so cramped that even just looking at the life-sized figures’ discomfort makes the viewer feel unwelcome too.

“I had felt like I was in the room with these figures, and I immediately felt extremely uncomfortable,” Atwell wrote. “While that feeling didn’t necessarily feel good, the fact that a painting could make me feel anything that strongly solidified my commitment to it being in my exhibition. I had no idea what I was going to do, but I knew that this painting had to be my anchor.”

“Frames Within Frames” ends with a slightly unexpected focus on wallpaper as a framing device through visual interruption. As Atwell puts it, “In place of a traditional physical border, the all-encompassing, repetitive pattern becomes an ersatz frame for whatever is mounted upon it.”

Walker Evans’ print, “Bed and Stove, Truro, Massachusetts,” demonstrates this through a framed portrait of a man on a wall adorned with old-fashioned wallpaper. The wallpaper can be read as a historical boundary, providing more context to the black-and-white portrait. The final work is Yarde’s “Untitled (Yellow Wallpaper).”

The watercolor painting features yellow, 1950s floral wallpaper, with a small portrait of a man at the top edge of it. The painted portrait, much like the photo in Evans’ piece, relies on the wallpaper that frames it to tell the viewer a story — one relating to the domestic space it is presumed to be in.

The fragmented structure of “Frames Within Frames” ultimately strengthens Atwell’s goal for viewers to think about the architectural and domestic barriers that often go unnoticed in art. Each wall focuses on a new type of indirect framing, while the works within each subsection contrast one another. No piece is alike, but that is what provokes viewers to consider the different ways in which framing can impact both life and art.

“Frames Within Frames: Intimacy through Visual Exchange” is free and open to the public until Saturday, Dec. 12.