EN
©Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture
Site by Rabbithole ↗
Popular searches:
Railway children Access What's on Learning Bassline

Website accessibility settings

Choose the right accessibility settings for you:

Do you have a question about website access?

Read more or get in touch with our team →
Full body image of lady (Aida Muluneh) in all black, posing in front of a blue wall with 4 images in a line across the wall
Video [3:28]

Interview: Aïda Muluneh

Travel behind the camera with photographer Aïda Muluneh as she creates new work for Nationhood: Memory and Hope.

Published: February 3, 2025

Ethiopian photographer Aïda Muluneh’s work reveals the overlooked stories, forgotten histories and quiet moments that shape who we are.

Find out more about the exhibition Nationhood: Memory and Hope at Impressions Gallery and the centrepiece of the exhibition The Necessity of Seeing, a major new collection of constructed images by Muluneh.

The act of creativity, there's an emotional element of it. We as artists make work, because there's something we need to get out of ourselves. But at the same time, it's also to try to engage people that don't know anything about my culture or where I come from.
Aïda Muluneh

This short film marks the opening of Nationhood: Memory and Hope, an outstanding collection of new photography celebrating the diversity of the UK in 2025. Curated by Anne McNeill, Director of Bradford’s Impressions Gallery, it opened during the launch weekend of Bradford 2025 – helping to kick off our year as UK City of Culture.

The centrepiece of the exhibition is The Necessity of Seeing, a major new collection of constructed images by Ethiopian photographer Aïda Muluneh. Shot through her surrealist lens at iconic locations in Bradford, Belfast, Cardiff and Glasgow, Muluneh’s new work reveals the overlooked stories, forgotten histories and quiet moments that shape who we are.

First seen on billboards around Bradford in autumn 2024, the exhibition also presents A Portrait of Us, Muluneh’s potent black and white photographs of unsung community heroes from the same four cities.

Nationhood: Memory and Hope is now open at Impressions Gallery. Catch the exhibition until 26 April 2025, after which it will travel to Belfast Exposed, Ffotogallery in Cardiff and Street Level Photoworks in Glasgow, later in the year.

Credits →
Videographer: Michael McCabe
Photograph: (c)Faye Hatton

Nationhood: Memory and Hope

New work from acclaimed Ethiopian artist Aïda Muluneh and seven UK photographers feature in this major exhibition at Impressions Gallery.

A woman with a white painted face in a red shawl and headscarf holds a white flower. She is sat in front of a blue background covered in yellow feathers. To the left of the image is a yellow wooden chair