Photo: Nika Erjavec / P74 Gallery Archive
10 November – 8 December 2026
P74 Gallery
______
Upon entering Nika Erjavec’s ambient installations, one first recognises the materials from which they are composed: corrugated roofing sheets, aluminium, concrete, pipes, electronics, and dried plants. In these installations, the artificial and the natural, the industrial and the organic meet. The woody plants, which at first glance appear as dead nature, are collected from areas of the third landscape, in seemingly neglected spaces where, in the absence of humans, a (surprisingly) diverse range of life flourishes. These elements are combined into hybrid objects, through which the artist creates multilayered sensory situations using sound, vibrations, and light. Within such an installation, the individual becomes one of the co-creators of what is happening, revealing their own abilities, ways of seeing, and perceptions of the surroundings.
This exhibition is presented in the context of the OHO Group Award. In the installation, the artist continues her exploration of property, control, and disruption. These themes were also present in her award-winning project Disruption of Property (2025), in which the visitor’s movement was transformed into an intervention that triggered a response from the installation. A body entering the space becomes part of a system in which every presence alters the functioning and perception of others. The materials employed by the artist possess a distinct visual materiality, while their form plays a crucial role in co-creating sensory effects: sound varies according to the material, shape, and surface through which it is transmitted, while light shifts are based on the »obstacles« against which it refracts, and stimuli enter our perceptual system uncompromisingly. Light, the most visually prominent element of the installations, is not merely a means of illumination but an active agent of perception, capable of simultaneously revealing and concealing an image. Flickering, light reflections, and so-called glitches expose the gap between what we look at and what we actually perceive. Our sensory experience is not a direct reflection of the external world, but is shaped by physiological limitations and the ways in which the nervous system processes stimuli.
The sonic component of the work is constructed through an interplay of pre-recorded soundscapes drawn from various urban areas and third landscapes, alongside sounds generated directly within the installation. Sound, therefore, is not merely a document of a selected location but a consequence of the material relationships established within the installation. Within this context, urban animals also occupy a distinct place; they adapt, with varying degrees of success, to urban environments reshaped to suit human needs. Frogs, crows, and New York raccoons indirectly reveal strategies for coexistence, opening up the possibility of a different perspective on urban nature and of imaginative ways of adapting and appropriating space. Nika Erjavec presents a complex system of elements that coexist and transform one another, including us and our perspectives. Light, sound, and vibration serve not merely as formal modes of expression but enable the exploration of the conditions under which something can become perceptible.
Nina Skumavc
______
Nika Erjavec (b. 1994) is an intermedia artist who explores vibration, urban wilderness, and the limits of human perception in her work. She creates interactive systems of kinetic, light, and sound installations that explore perception, power relations, and our relationship to the environment. In 2021, she received her master’s degree from the Department of Sculpture, having previously graduated from the Department for Unique Design at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana. Nika Erjavec is the recipient of the 2025 OHO Group Award. Over the past decade, she has exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Slovenia and abroad. Most recently, in September 2026, she participated in the group exhibition Something’s glitching in the house in New York. Since 2026, she has held a position as an assistant in the Department of Video, Animation, and New Media at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Ljubljana. Two of her permanent installations can be found in Ljubljana: the interactive light ambient Cellular Landscapes, located in the pavilion in front of the University Medical Centre Ljubljana (2024, a collaborative project of Prostorož, University Medical Centre Ljubljana, and Forum Ljubljana), and the interactive sound installation V/posluh at the Slovenian Institute of Chemistry in Ljubljana, co-authored with Doroteja Erhatič in 2022.