The exhibition Some Time Before the End brings together works by Adelina Popnedeleva, Boris Missirkov / Georgi Bogdanov, Krassimir Terziev, Luchezar Boyadjiev, and Nadezhda Oleg Lyahova from the collection of Sofia City Art Gallery, and places them in dialogue with a new short story by Joanna Elmy, written especially for the project. The title is borrowed from the writer’s text, which enters into conversation with the artworks and offers a new framework for experiencing them. Inspired by the works, the story is their immediate literary echo.

The exhibition stems from the desire to set aside the “code” we sometimes use when speaking about contemporary art. Some Time Before the End also returns to an old dilemma: how much explanation is needed, and when does it start to get in the way. That is why literature is present as an equal partner in the conversation: another way to approach the works without fixing them in a single interpretation.

The works in the exhibition do not insist on being “decoded”—they speak for themselves. Joanna Elmy’s story likewise does not explain or attach “labels”; instead, it unlocks associations and opens up possibilities for reading.

The project also fits within Sofia City Art Gallery’s broader programme for 2026–2027, which includes two exhibition projects addressing the theme of the apocalypse and the personal sense of the end of the world in the context of crises and wars. The first is the present exhibition, which connects a literary text with a selection from the gallery’s Contemporary Art Collection; the second is The World Ends Every Day by curator Galina Dimitrova-Dimova, which invites international artists to collaborate with Bulgarian colleagues and to explore the theme through the lens of poetic political art.

Curator: Victoria Gyuleva

Curator : Victoria Gyuleva