What You Leave Behind

Nikoline Sonasson

In a sweeping contrast of white-blue ice and severe black rock, the beauty of 'Glacier Wave' captivates and holds the attention. It is in this moment of attention that we notice the slick, reflective surface of the ice, which indicates that it is melting. In an instant, the photograph transforms, from an object of aesthetic contemplation to a piece of art carrying a potent political and environmental message. Nikoline Sonasson's photographs are enchanting, representing ethereal icy scenes that defy traditional ways of looking at and understanding landscapes. In 'Ice Moulin' ('Moulin' being a well-like shaft that can penetrate all the way to the bottom of a glacier), the viewer becomes disoriented, as our eyes seek out something familiar upon which to hang a sense of scale. There are none to be found, and thus we must engage with the landscape on its own terms. Nikoline (a 2023 Glasgow School of Art graduate and New Blood Art Emerging Art Prize nominee) is concerned with the interaction of humans, landscape and time, and 'What You Leave Behind' offers a stark reminder of this troubled relationship. The work's title is two-fold - a retreating glacier leaves behind entire carved landscapes in its wake, yet the accumulated activities of humans leave an even bigger impact behind, felt both in the retreat of specific glaciers and at a global scale. The work asks us what it means to address the earth, the 'You' of the title at once individual and global. The landscape of 'What You Leave Behind' is beautifully balanced, the oppressive sky mirroring the white of the distant glacier, the foreground dominated by the dark, inescapable absence of ice.