Venue: GGM2, ul. Powroźnicza 13/15
Date: 7 June 2024, 6 PM
Admission free
We cordially invite you to a guided tour of exhibition “The Mystery is Looking” with its curator Jakub Banasiak and artist Alicja Żebrowska, which will take place on Friday 7 June; 6 PM.
“The Mystery is Looking” showcases Alicja Żebrowska’s major works from the time of transition in Poland in the late 1980s and early 1990s. During that period, Żebrowska took inspiration from esotericism and mysticism. In the reality of a crumbling world and the simultaneous creation of a new one, Żebrowska looked for traces of the cosmic unity and harmony of being. The astral union of male and female elements, the alchemical transformation, the figure of the androgyne, the collision of light and matter, the perfection of architecture of the universe, the primeval time enchanted in the Tatra Mountains, and timelessness of the transformative everyday life – these are just some of the motifs present in Żebrowska’s early works. All this puts her oeuvre in a broader context: the art of the new spirituality from the transition era.
Jakub Banasiak
Art historian and art critic, Assistant Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Faculty of Artistic Research and Curatorial Studies. He is the author of the book titled Proteous Times. The Decay of the State Art System 1982–1993 (2020). He is the editor-in-chief of the academic journal Miejsce (with Marika Kuźmicz), and Szum art magazine (with Karolina Plinta). He focuses on research into art, as well as art history and state art system, of the Post-communist transformation period.
Alicja Żebrowska
She is one of the most important Polish contemporary artists. She has participated in dozens of solo and group exhibitions. Her works from the 1990s are part of the Polish art canon of the 20th century. Between 1978–1981, she studied at the Art Institute of the Maria Curie Skłodowska University in Lublin, from which she graduated with a diploma in sculpture in 1981. During the period from 1989 to 1992, she completed postgraduate studies under Professor Wander Bertoni at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, and was also an auditing student at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts. In 1992, she obtained a post graduate diploma at the studio of Professor Bertoni. From 1993 to 1996, she worked with the Zderzak Gallery in Krakow. She was a member of the Fort Sztuki Artistic Association in Krakow from 1996 to 2006. She has been collaborating with Galeria Nova in Krakow since 2008. She lives and works in Zakopane.
Photo: Alina Żemojdzin
