Mountains, hills, plains, and lakes—that is what we think we see in the abstract, dusky works of Nadezda Nikolova, but they don’t exist in reality. The photograms are produced in the darkroom using the old and elaborate technique—wet collodion. The landscapes are transformed into elemental forms, giving room for a profound spiritual interpretation of the work. “My work is about hope. How can we transmute pollution and destruction? It's a spiritual way of looking at things to transform them into their original state.”

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The 19th-century collodion technique is mainly associated with a cumbersome 8x10-inch view camera, but even though she possesses one, Nadezda Nikolova does not use it in her recent abstract works. Instead, with the collodion, she creates photograms in the darkroom by direct exposure to light and manual interference with different objects. “I discovered I always wanted to escape photography or transcend beyond it. I'm a painter at heart, and I always wanted to find ways to come near to it, either through multiple exposures or through artefacts created with the fluidity of the chemistry.” When she discovered the photogram, she created her process by experimenting in the darkroom, searching for mysterious images. “The visual language derived from the fluidity of the process was a process of exciting discovery from the beginning, through trial and error.” 

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Intuition 

Nikolova used her intuition to pursue her work, motivated by curiosity and an experimental spirit. “When I started with photography, I felt this was my medium. Even though I could do interesting things with the camera, it felt limiting. I wasn't afraid to try different things. The process of discovery is fascinating. It's akin to being a child in awe. The manually made photograph feels like a true way to express my inner world and ideas. I started landscape work as a mix of painting, collage, and photography because I employ paper as masks under a source of light in the darkroom. Every image starts with a sketch, after which I cut out different paper shapes, which I use to block the light selectively.”

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We need the darkness to experience the light, progress, evolve and learn. The darkness is part of the light, and I believe the light is all-compassing.

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Her work is produced with a balance between intuition and concept. “I allow my intuition to guide me. I have trust in my guidance and the process, but I also rely on the technical skill I developed over many years of practice. My dexterity lets me focus on the creative aspect. It's always a balance. My work's overarching theme is finding the balance between control and surrender and intuition and technicality.”
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Layer of time

The abstract plates Nikolova produces in the darkroom are unique because of the fluidity and inherent unpredictability of the analogue process. “Chemistry has a mind of its own. It constantly changes due to age, impurities, temperature, and humidity. I adapt the artwork to chemistry if I like a particular effect. Sometimes, it's a bit of a co-creation.”

Each piece is made from multiple exposures under red light conditions, challenging the process. But for Nikolova, it only boosts her creativity. “One of the many limitations of the photogram is that I work blindly, as I don't see what is happening on the emulsion while moving paper masks and making multiple exposures. Only at the moment I start developing can I glean what has happened during the exposure. When I place the panel in the fixer, I see the full results, but at this moment, it is impossible to make changes other than perhaps create scratches or marks on the wet emulsion.”

The way of working with abstract photograms contributes to a layer of time. “Once the chemicals are dry, they lose their photosensitivity. I am working against time. I only have about three to five minutes to complete the composition, and sometimes I make 30 different exposures on a single panel. You can imagine why I'm holding my breath!”
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Magical landscapes

Even though her work is abstract, the initial inspiration comes from the landscapes of the nearby redwood forest. “I'm fortunate to live in a magical landscape. I live close to redwood forests that overlook the bay and the ocean. There's this confluence of different elements of the landscape. I spend a lot of time in nature and feel connected to it. The natural forces and the landscape are my main sources of inspiration. After I return home from a walk in the woods, I make sketches and decide on the size of the panels, whether the composition will be on a single panel or a multi-panel piece, and which artefacts to employ. I must have a clear idea of what I want to do before I go into the darkroom because the materials are precious, and I only have one chance to get it right.”

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The natural forces and the landscape are my main sources of inspiration.

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Nadezda Nikolova recreates her experience of hiking in the woods on an abstract level, without the details of the landscape but with the lines and shapes as the primary visual vocabulary. “Some of the work is more figurative and recognisable: here's the mountain; here's the horizon. It flows back and forth into high abstraction, depending on the series. In my recent work, I'm deconstructing and decomposing the landscape into organic lines, which I rearrange into new formations. The concept behind this work is viewing the landscape as an idea. This new work is about new frames of perception and claiming new possibilities.” 
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Spiritual connection

The technical challenges all serve the artistic value of the work and the spiritual connection it makes with the viewer, which is Nikolova’s primary interest. “The work is well thought out; there is a concept behind it, but it's not overly intellectual. I am more interested in whether the viewer can connect with the piece on an emotional and energetic level.” 

Even though her work is abstract, the multi-layered depths should provoke an emotional reaction. “What moves and inspires me are poetic, philosophical, and esoteric influences originating from things I read, and all that filters into the work as different layers, which the viewer may discover.”

Nadezda Nikolova is steeped in spiritual teachings drawn from many ancient esoteric and philosophical traditions that speak of connecting to the divine. “The easiest gateway to the greater reality of which we are part is through nature because nature vibrates at a higher level, making that connection much more accessible. Nature is grounding and healing and offers a direct experience of the spiritual and the sacred. Spending time in nature is, for me, a physical experience that goes beyond the five senses. My work attempts to capture a glimmer of this experience. It is a translation of how I experience my surroundings. My work is about witnessing the landscape of the Anthropocene—the heavy human footprint—while being deeply grounded in the spiritual perspective that the divine is present even in things that we find difficult and painful to look at.” 

Immanence

The overall darkness of the work is a striking visual feature, which technically comes from the material of the black aluminium panels and ethereal silver, but also may suggest moodiness and gloominess. Or is there a hidden metaphor, an invocation of hope? Nikolova stresses the balance between light and dark: “The work is about balancing the positive and negative space—the light and dark areas. It's also about bringing light into the darkness because I start with the pitch-black panel. Photography is painting or drawing with light. I'm illuminating a dark panel and transforming it with photochemistry and light. So perhaps the process itself is a metaphor for deeper concepts. We need the darkness to experience the light, progress, evolve and learn. The darkness is part of the light, and I believe the light is all-encompassing.” 

In recent times, landscape and nature have been associated with the environmental crisis, extracting the romantic innocence from landscape photography. The work of Nikolova might be seen as a reaction to this issue in a healing way. “My work is about hope. How can we transmute pollution and destruction? It's a spiritual way of looking at things to alchemise them into their original state. It's a way of reclaiming our vision and our mental reaction of condemning and reviling. According to ancient spiritual and philosophical traditions, God exists in all forms and can be experienced in everything. It represents a source of infinite creative force from which everything arises and to which everything returns. I prefer to use the word immanence, which suggests that the divine is inside the material. The essence of my work is about reclaiming what we have placed in darkness.”
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Physicality 

Connected to the spiritual value is the importance of the physicality of the work. “The fact that it's a unique physical object makes it feel precious, perhaps echoing the natural world: everything that exists in nature—each blade of grass, thumbprint, wave—has a unique and unrepeatable signature or imprint. It adds a layer to the work that is very important to me as an artist, similar to a painting, which exists as a one-of-a-kind object. Some of my pieces would look beautiful if enlarged, but I feel it would take away from the idea that my work is meant to exist as an originally created image-object.

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Exhibition NADEZDA NIKOLOVA - Unique Works 4 February – 1 April 2023‍

HackelBury Fine Art, London, is pleased to present Unique Works, a solo exhibition of work by NadezdaNikolova in which the artist seeks to capture a singular sense of oneness and universal connectivity in her work through multi-layered compositions.

https://hackelbury.co.uk

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Born in 1978 (present-day Serbia), Nadezda Nikolova is a Croatian-Bulgarian-American photographic artist. She studied 19th-century phototrophic printing processes at the University of Kentucky and the George Eastman Museum. Prior to becoming a full-time artist, she earned a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Science & Conservation and a Master’s degree in Policy Analysis. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. She is based in Oakland, California and is represented by HackelBury Fine Art, London and Esther Woerdehoff Gallery, Paris.

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All images courtesy HackelBury Fine Art, London

www.nadezdanikolova.com