URANIUM SKIES
MONIKA NIWELINSKA
OPENING MAY 8TH FROM 5-9PM
MATERIALITY OF RADIATION
THE DECAY OF THE VISIBL
VIEW EXHIBITION
RADIOACTIVE
MONIKA NIWELINSKA
OPENING RECEPTION:
FRIDAY, MAY 8, FROM 5-9 PM
WORK ON DISPLAY THROUGH
At HARD RETURN, Monika Niwelinska presents Radioactive, a body of work that moves through the unstable terrain between photography and radiation. Here, the photographic image is not a neutral record but an active site, one that absorbs, distorts, and emits. Photosensitivity becomes both method and metaphor, linking the chemical responsiveness of film to the unseen forces of radioactive exposure.
Niwelinska approaches radioactive landscapes as overexposed zones, where visibility collapses under intensity. These are not simply places but conditions, environments saturated with histories that resist direct representation. The work navigates the threshold where image-making fails, where light overwhelms form, and where absence begins to carry more weight than presence.
Drawing from the topography of Shoah and post-Holocaust spaces, Radioactive engages the lingering imprint of trauma embedded within land and material. The works do not attempt to reconstruct memory in a conventional sense. Instead, they operate through (post)memory, where what remains is fragmented, displaced, and often imperceptible. Surfaces become carriers of latent histories, holding traces that cannot fully emerge into view.
Through processes of exposure, degradation, and material intervention, Niwelinska reveals photography as a medium uniquely capable of registering what cannot be seen. Radiation leaves no immediate image, yet its presence alters everything it touches. In a similar way, these works hold a quiet charge, where the past persists as a hidden force, shaping perception from beneath the surface.
Niwelinska approaches radioactive landscapes as overexposed zones, where visibility collapses under intensity. These are not simply places but conditions, environments saturated with histories that resist direct representation. The work navigates the threshold where image-making fails, where light overwhelms form, and where absence begins to carry more weight than presence.
Drawing from the topography of Shoah and post-Holocaust spaces, Radioactive engages the lingering imprint of trauma embedded within land and material. The works do not attempt to reconstruct memory in a conventional sense. Instead, they operate through (post)memory, where what remains is fragmented, displaced, and often imperceptible. Surfaces become carriers of latent histories, holding traces that cannot fully emerge into view.
Through processes of exposure, degradation, and material intervention, Niwelinska reveals photography as a medium uniquely capable of registering what cannot be seen. Radiation leaves no immediate image, yet its presence alters everything it touches. In a similar way, these works hold a quiet charge, where the past persists as a hidden force, shaping perception from beneath the surface.