Batia Suter’s installation presented in NŌUA, Octahedral, is a captivating exploration of architectural shapes and photographic artistry. Suter digitally manipulates images sourced from old books and magazines, presenting them in two expansive montages within the gallery space. The first projection showcases significant architectural structures across history, resonating personally with the artist. Meanwhile, the second projection features an animated sequence of plastic food containers, creating an ongoing, fluid display of evolving forms and shapes. The still images present a continuous slideshow where subjects morph seamlessly, intertwining Suter’s photographs taken in Bodø into the exhibition’s fabric.

Architect Sami Rintala’s design for the gallery creates a deliberate contrast with the buildings depicted in the videos, highlighting the evolution of contemporary photographic practices. This deliberate pairing emphasizes architecture’s role in narrative storytelling, influencing our intellectual and perceptual understanding, shaping individual experiences, memories, and social interactions.

Initially appearing fragmented and detached from their original contexts, these depictions now form a cohesive, animated arrangement, pulsating with an organic coherence that invigorates the gallery. Suter’s amalgamation of elements from disparate times and cultures encourages a profound contemplation of architecture’s enduring impact on our perceptions, memories,and collective consciousness. Suter’s exhibition serves as a conduit shaped by human experience, prompting reflection on our surroundings, the significance of the structures we create, inhabit, and engage with, and how these constructs mold our understanding of ourselves and our place in the world.

The exhibition is the first of the 2024 program at NŌUA, as an official collaboration with the European Capital of Culture Bodø 2024. The program is part of the collaborative project Out of the Metropolis - Art exchange across borders initiated by NŌUA, in partnership with the Finnish Museum of Photography(Helsinki) and DoubleDummy (Arles, Frances).