Soft systems

Everything is holding something else up.

Nika Sol folds, balances and photographs materials on the edge of giving way. A study of support, transparency and the useful beauty of an imperfect structure.

A sheet becomes a wall, a curve becomes a hinge, and a shadow becomes a material in its own right. Sol’s arrangements are assembled without a permanent join. Resin, mesh and glass lean into each other, making dependence visible in a language of folds and small, precise contacts.

The camera fixes these provisional structures while daylight keeps changing them. Paired photographs show the same arrangement hours apart. What seemed solid turns translucent; a modest crease becomes the organising line of the whole picture.

Material samples at the centre of the exhibition offer another way into the images. Visitors can feel the difference between a surface that bends and one that only looks as though it might. The works are accompanied by short diagrams of how each arrangement holds together.