Elena Volkova’s work is based on a child’s exercise—taking pictures of the clouds below out the window of airplanes—but her presentation of those images is sophisticated and mature. Volkova prints her cloud pictures on large sheets of crisp white paper with white borders, allowing the faint images to fade into the paper itself. In some prints, the clouds are so white it’s difficult to tell if you’re looking at anything at all. That’s exactly how Volkova aims to manipulate, and also where she’s at her best: She makes us ponder what constitutes an image and whether the nothingness we glimpse contains something, after all.

THE EXHIBITION IS ON VIEW FROM NOON TO 6 P.M. TUESDAYS THROUGH SATURDAYS TO SATURDAY, DEC. 20, AT FLASHPOINT, 916 G ST. NW. FREE. (202) 315-1305.