Dominika Trapp
Nobody Dreams of Nuclear Power Plants
6 Paintings, 60 x 40 cm each, 2024
Handmade paper, watercolor crayons, pressed plants collected in the vicinity of Paks NPP
Dominika Trapp's work delves into the intimate relationship between the workers and the Paks Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) in Hungary. Through in-depth interviews with employees spanning a wide spectrum of roles—from cleaning staff and technical school trainees to high-ranking engineers—Trapp explores their personal interpretations and embodied experiences of the reactor’s inner workings. Her research focuses on their subjective visions of the power plant and nuclear energy, in terms of the technology itself and their daily interactions with it.
The personal conversations led by the artist reveal the NPP as an anthropomorphic technological entity, whose physical omnipresence, technological complexity, and far-reaching social and economic impact on the city and its people's lives have become normalized and naturalized throughout the years. While many employees struggle to articulate their bodily reactions and emotions in the shadow of this enigmatic and often intimidating technology, their descriptions of the power plant convey a sense of it as a living, breathing force. Their motifs and metaphors are often sentimental, transcendental, even familial. The NPP is framed in terms of belonging and identification, resembling the dynamics of a patriarchal family more than a typical workplace.
Generational differences in perception also emerge as a key theme, reflecting broader shifts in humanity’s understanding of technology. Older engineers who joined the plant shortly after its inauguration, describe it with clinical precision, likening it to a mechanistic body, dissecting it through an anatomical lens. In contrast, younger employees have a more post-digital, science-fiction infused perspective informed by video games such as Minecraft. These contrasting views highlight how evolving technological paradigms shape individual relationships with industrial environments.
Trapp's intricate and intuitive paintings aim to capture these complex associations, offering a multifaceted portrait of the nuclear power plant. She paints on hand-molded paper, incorporating pressed plants collected from around the fishing pond near the nuclear facility. This location also serves as the backdrop for many of the idyllic nature photographs exhibited in the NPP's information center that they merchandise as calendars and postcards. Through this symbolic "greenwashing" and further naturalization on paper, Trapp subtly critiques the efforts to present nuclear energy as green, and points to how nuclear infrastructures use environmental preservation to improve its public image.
Special thanks: Antal Kovács, Andrásné Kovács, Miklós Takács, Róbert Doroghi, Dr. Katalin Gerákné Krasz, István Bartos, Zoltán Csanádi, Márk Rédl, András Farkas, Erika Schneider, Péter Nagy
DOMINIKA TRAPP (1988, Budapest) graduated from the painting department of the Hungarian University of Fine Arts in 2012. Her practice has been characterized by a two-way interest: on the one hand, a sensitive painterly approach that allows for intuition and introspection; on the other, an outward-directed sensitivity that facilitates dialogues between communities in the service of collective self-knowledge. More recently, she has participated in the residency programs of Art in General in New York, the Erste Stiftung in Vienna, and FUTURA in Prague. In 2020, her solo exhibition was presented at Trafó Gallery in Budapest and Karlin Studios in Prague. In 2021, she participated at the 14th Baltic Triennial in Vilnius, in 2022 at the Manifesta 14 in Prishtina, and in 2023 at EVA International – Ireland's Biennial in Limerick. She is currently a multimedia art fellow at the Doctoral School of the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design.
