As part of the EMOP, the exhibition SHADES OF SHAPE brings together, for the first time, works by Nina Laaf and Nina Röder.

With a keen eye for form and materiality, both artists engage with what lies beneath the surface. In her photographic series Darkness in Which I Swim, Nina Röder explores life beneath the ocean. Although marine creatures such as algae and octopuses are ecologically essential to our existence, they are often perceived as unsettling. Röder highlights their aesthetic qualities by integrating them into performative interactions or illuminating their cognitive abilities.

Nina Laaf focuses on the texture and boundaries of different surfaces. She stages and explores their shapes and properties, questioning and sometimes reversing them. These hybridizations create an ambiguity that challenges both the creative process and the materiality itself. Both positions bring together various dimensions through their unique language of form and image, creating a dialog that encourages reflective and comparative thinking on the relationship between humans, nature, and materials.