Echoes of a Nuclear Dream [Visual Notes from Belene]

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Belene, April 2026. Photo: Roberta Koleva

Echoes of a Nuclear Dream is a zine and photo series that emerges from ethnographic fieldwork in Belene, a Bulgarian Danube town shaped by the unfinished nuclear power plant repeatedly suspended and revived across decades. The photographs follow ordinary landscapes where postponed futures continue to leave material traces — abandoned workers’ housing blocks, infrastructural fragments, gardens, pathways, quieter forms of reuse, and new promises entering old spaces. The work asks what remains when the future never fully arrives, yet never entirely disappears.

You can have a look at the whole zine below. If you are using a phone, for a better view, please use portrait mode.





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