Reminder: opening ESNS Photo on 14 January
Next week, the ESNS spectacle takes over the city once again. This year, for the first time, we bring music and photography together in ESNS Photo. We present the work of three photographers and their perspective on music. Nick Helderman, Niels Knelis Meijer and Jantina Talsma look as if they are listening and invite you to do the same.
📅 14–18 January 2026
Opening: 14 January, 15:00
Farewell reception Wim Melis: 14 January, 16:30
After 35 years, head curator Wim Melis is bidding farewell to Noorderlicht. From the very beginning, he helped shape and build the organisation. Last month, Paulien Dresscher spoke with him about photography, context, and the importance of coherence in a world saturated with images.
https://noorderlicht.com/en/updates/wim-melis-vijfendertig-jaar-kijken
On Wednesday, January 14, at 16:30h, Noorderlicht invites everyone to the gallery to look back on this period. Please email rsvp@noorderlicht.com to register.
📷: Philip Apagya
Noorderlicht Advent #24: As the year comes to rest, we would like to thank everyone who looked, listened, questioned, and thought along with us: makers, partners, and visitors. It has been a beautiful biennial year which we celebrated with many visitors across the three northern provinces. We wish you happy holidays and look forward to what will unfold in the new year✨
📷: David Vroom
#noorderlichtadvent #digitaladvent #countdowntochristmas #decemberstories
Noorderlicht Advent #23: In the autumn of 2025, we celebrated 70 years of World Press Photo at Noorderlicht with ‘What Have We Done? Unpacking Seven Decades of World Press Photo’, an exhibition that invited us to pause and reflect on images from the past and how their meanings continue to shift. What do these photographs tell us today, and how might we re-read their stories today?
📷: Tim van der Kuip
#noorderlichtadvent #digitaladvent #countdowntochristmas #decemberstories
Noorderlicht Advent #22: New Digital Mirror essay online! 📖 In “To what is left rootbound in emptied ground,” Lilian Anneloes weaves personal observations of gardens and landscapes with a historical analysis of how the taming of so-called “untamed” nature went hand in hand with systems of control and colonisation.
Read the full essay now on our website.
Prefer it on paper? The Machine Entanglements catalogue is available in our webshop.
Noorderlicht Advent #21: Today is the very last day to see ‘Rauw Vermogen’. The exhibition opened alongside the premiere of the World Press Photo anniversary exhibition at the Niemeyer and later moved to our gallery. Together with seven emerging photographers from the North, we explored Groningen as it is today and as it might be in the future.
📷: Tim van der Kuip
#noorderlichtadvent #digitaladvent #countdowntochristmas #decemberstories
Noorderlicht Advent #20: In the former Niemeyer factory, once a proud symbol of Groningen’s industrial progress, ‘Machine Entanglements’ also explored the shadow side of technological innovation. What if technology is not merely a tool for acceleration, control or extraction, but also a chance to repair, reconnect, and unearth forgotten histories?
Artwork: Thomas Nolf
Photo: Tim van der Kuip
#noorderlichtadvent #digitaladvent #countdowntochristmas #decemberstories
Noorderlicht Advent #19: On the occasion of its 70th anniversary exhibition, we presented a pop-up festival together with World Press Photo at the Niemeyer. By bringing together local photographers, critical thinkers, and audiences, the festival invited participants to explore how photographic images communicate and influence understanding, how they engage with assumptions, bias, and narrative frameworks, and how visual stories help shape society.
📷: Tim van der Kuip
Noorderlicht Advent #18: After thirty-five years of involvement with Noorderlicht, head curator Wim Melis is stepping down from the organization he helped build from the very beginning. Last month, Paulien Dresscher sat down with him for an interview.
You can read the full interview on our website: https://noorderlicht.com/en/updates/wim-melis-vijfendertig-jaar-kijken
On Wednesday, January 14, at 16:30h, Noorderlicht invites everyone to the gallery to look back on this period together with Wim.
📷: Philip Apagya
ESNS Photo 2026 🎸 presenting… NICK HELDERMAN
For Nick Helderman, it all began with a camera in his hand and music in his system. As a tour photographer he stood close to the artists, and there he found his intuitive way of seeing, where light and colour seem to talk to each other.
👉 See his work at ESNS Photo 2026, 14–17 January at Galerie Noorderlicht.
