ABSTRACT
The concept of architectures of hiding prompts new ways of thinking about the limits and possibilities of material forms not only to reveal but also to conceal. The histories of slavery, colonialism and genocide reveal how built structures have been operationalized to enact the violent subjection of others. Holocaust memory has been a rich site of nuanced engagements with architectures of hiding. Natalia Romik’s exhibition Hideouts: The Architecture of Survival, exhibited at the Zacheta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw in 2022, investigated and commemorated the long-term hiding places built and used by Jews during the Holocaust. Both enabling a closer examination of the natural landscape and serving as documentation of that landscape; the image works in different ways at different ranges. Set design documents, photographs of the full-scale model and architectural figures map the spatial elements of the play and lead visitors to contemplate the generative possibilities and impossibilities of constraint.
