The exhibition Eyes to Speak is the result of Mia Milgrom’s participation in the Terra Incognita art residency in Opole. The artist, who lives and works in the Czech Republic, came to Poland in March 2025 to explore the titular “unknown land” — a region of Upper Silesia that is less recognized, lacking grand monuments or iconic natural landmarks, and thus often overlooked. What unfolded before her was a different kind of landscape — one where nature intertwines with the remnants of industrial infrastructure.
The title Eyes to Speak poses a question about the possibility of communication without words — through gaze, image, and presence. It becomes a metaphor for observation and engagement with a place that may feel unfamiliar, yet becomes a temporary site of artistic exploration and reflection.
Milgrom turns her gaze beneath the water, exploring landscapes that are both natural and industrial. Immersing herself in the aquatic environment is both a literal and symbolic descent — into a realm where sound fades and sight becomes the primary means of perception.
The title can thus be understood as an attempt to “speak with the eyes,” but also to listen — to what the act of looking can reveal about a landscape that is simultaneously beautiful and contaminated, alive and mechanized. The underwater environments of the Opole region — rivers, post-industrial quarries, traces of human intervention — become spaces for contemplating the relationship between people and nature. Industrial structures submerged underwater begin to take on organic characteristics, while natural forms, marked by human activity, appear almost artificially constructed — as if shaped by the tools of civilization.
The exhibition is also a meditation on the limits of language: how do we speak about a place we do not fully know? How do we express experiences in an unfamiliar linguistic and cultural context? How can we speak of water — silent, yet carrying the weight of ecological and social crises? Milgrom proposes a mode of looking that does not merely document but becomes a form of sensitive presence. Here, the gaze is a gesture of openness — a first step toward understanding, a quiet dialogue with a reality that often resists verbalization. In the absence of elaborate narratives, we may become more receptive to new forms of experience — to the simple, yet profound presence of the world.
- Agnieszka Dela-Kropiowska
, 2025