Wondering how to allocate your 1% tax? Donate it to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and… exhibitions and activities undertaken by the Society!

Such as, for example… a project which was created a few years ago in cooperation with the Society’s board. The exhibition “TRUTH, BEAUTY, GOOD”, whose title, with its idealistic, yet thoroughly up-to-date message, refers to Plato’s triad of the highest ideas and values, known from philosophy, and at the same time is a quotation from one of the works presented at the exhibition. We wish to have as many similar exhibitions as possible in the future and we hope to inform you soon about our planned, completely new, activities.

Our activities would not be possible without the commitment of the Society’s members and friends of Zachęta!

Open Zachęta is a social Zachęta. We need your 1% to act! Society

KRS No.: 0000165010

At the photo: Alina Szapocznikow, Embodied tumours, 1971

On Saturday, 2 April, the Society’s members were guided by artist Natalia Romik and anthropologist Aleksandra Janus through the newly opened exhibition “Hideouts. Architecture of Survival” at the Zachęta Gallery.

Natalia Romik’s exhibition is an artistic tribute to the architecture of survival, the hiding places built and used by Jews during the Holocaust. They used tree hollows, wardrobes, city sewers, caves or empty graves to create temporary shelters. The Zachęta exhibition halls present mirror casts of 9 hiding places from Poland and present-day Ukraine. The sculptural forms are accompanied by an exhibition presenting the results of interdisciplinary research carried out by Natalia Romik and Aleksandra Janus together with a team of anthropologists, historians, archaeologists and urban explorers.

All information about events related to the exhibition can be found on the Zachęta website.

Wondering how to allocate your 1% tax? Donate it to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and… support our work for the openness and accessibility of culture!

As in previous years, we want to continue the idea of Open Zachęta. We used to think of the building in such a way that, over the years, this idea would be transformed into a value bringing with it openness, accessibility, respect for others and tolerance. This is linked to our belief in art, in the artists who create it and in the public. Open Zachęta is our belief in the importance of education and the need to continue educational activities in which contemporary art is a tool to help understand the world, teaching critical and original thinking, openness to others, and empathy.

The “Open Zachęta” project, i.e. the digitalisation and conservation of Zachęta’s collection and its posting on the website so that it is accessible to all, is part of this idea.

Our activities would not be possible without the commitment of the Society’s members and friends of Zachęta!

Open Zachęta is a social Zachęta. We need your 1% to make it work!

Society KRS No.: 0000165010

Wondering how to allocate your 1% tax? Donate it to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and… support educational activities at Zachęta!

Zachęta National Gallery of Art is a gallery open to the variety of needs of its audience. Every day it takes further steps to make its collections, exhibitions and the building itself more accessible. Educational programmes accompanying exhibitions include events translated into Polish Sign Language and provided with audio description. Zachęta also runs regular series of meetings at its Art for Visually and Hearing Impaired exhibitions. We strive to meet the expectations and perception capabilities of other groups and environments, including, among others, people on the autism spectrum. Our aim is to reach as wide a group of recipients as possible, including people who, due to their condition, are excluded from participating in cultural and educational events on a daily basis. Especially in these difficult times, let us remember that the role of art is to bring people together.

Open Zachęta is a social Zachęta. We need your 1% to act! Society

KRS No.: 0000165010

Members of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts took part in a guided tour of the MATERIA(L)NIE – Alicja Bielawska & Barbara Falender exhibition at the Galeria Studio, where they were shown by curator Paulina Olszewska and artist Alicja Bielawska.

The starting point of the exhibition is Barbara Falender’s 1973 series of sculptures “Erotic Pillows” from the Galeria Studio Collection. The sculptures, made in Carrara marble, entered the collection in 1985. Alicja Bielawska, an artist of the younger generation, was invited to enter into dialogue with them.

Central to the art of both artists is the work with material and its properties. By transforming the physical, and therefore the real, the artists move into the realm of the sensual and impressionistic. The tension between two qualities, materiality and sensuality, is the main axis of the exhibition.

The exhibition runs until 17 April.

The situation in Ukraine has overshadowed all other events, including those from the world of culture, and has left us feeling sad and anxious. For those of you who are looking for a bit of solace in these difficult, for all of us, times, we would like to offer you Mariusz Wilczyński’s newly opened exhibition at Zachęta.

The exhibition focuses on one film – the feature-length debut of this well-known animator, the award-winning “Kill It and Leave This Town” from 2020. The feature-length animation is the artist’s journey through the land of memories, in which people and places close to him pass by. Łódź is the background for this surreal story, and its heroes are real, invented or literary characters.
“Kill It and Leave This Town” combines the atmosphere of a sleepy dream with realism and black humour, high culture with pop culture, personal memories with the description of reality.

The exhibition is open from 03.03 to 26.06.2022

Admission to all exhibitions at Zachęta Gallery is free for refugees from Ukraine.

At this very difficult time, with Russian troops attacking Ukraine, we are all wondering how we can help. Below you will find a list of proven organisations that you can support. Our thoughts are with our friends and the entire art community in Ukraine. We believe in the principle that art exists beyond all divisions.

https://ocalenie.org.pl/

https://humandoc.pl/en/

https://www.pah.org.pl/en/

https://pomagam.pl/

https://razomforukraine.org/

https://savelife.in.ua/en/donate/

https://unitedhelpukraine.org/

https://www.patreon.com/savelife_in_ua

https://bank.gov.ua/en

In the photo: Scarf prepared for the 5th World Festival of Youth and Students for Peace, 1952 Artist: Pablo Picasso

Wondering how to allocate your 1% tax? Donate it to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and… the summer programme on Malachowski Square!

The Summer Programme at Małachowskiego Square consists of performances, theatre and dance shows as well as installations and activities that have been taking place for several years in the square in front of Zachęta Gallery. The space of the exhibition is Małachowskiego Square – closed to cars, made available to artists and the public so as to create a safe, open and accessible space for anyone and everyone under Marek Sobczyk’s Simple Rainbow!

Our activities would not be possible without the involvement of the Society’s members and friends of Zachęta!

Open Zachęta is a social Zachęta.

We need your 1% to act!

Society KRS No.: 0000165010

The exhibition in the capital’s M. Rej Secondary School preceding the charity auction for the ‘Back to School’ project, scheduled for late February, is behind us. Both the exhibition and the auction are the next stage of the “Back to School” project of the Razem Pamoja Foundation, created in cooperation with the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts

The idea of the originator of the project, the Razem Pamoja Foundation, is to introduce contemporary artists into Polish schools and, drawing on the tradition of modernism, to promote a stimulating learning environment model. This culture-forming, but also philanthropic potential of “Back to School” is presented, among others, by the exhibition which could be seen at the M. Rej Secondary School on Plac Małachowskiego in Warsaw.

We would like to invite you to the auction of the objects, which will take place on 24 February in the foyer of the Sofitel Warsaw Victoria Hotel and on the website of the partner of the action Artinfo.pl

The income from the auction will be earmarked for the implementation of artistic commissions in other institutions.

Link to the auction catalogue: https://artinfo.pl/katalogi-aukcyjne/aukcja-sztuki-wspolczesnej-powrot-do-szkoly

A January outing to Łódź is slowly becoming a New Year tradition of the Association for the Encouragement of Fine Arts. After a relatively “lazy” Friday evening (i.e. only one exhibition during the whole day – the vernissage of Marek Sobczyk’s exhibition), Saturday passed much more intensively for the members of the Association:

• At the Central Museum of Textiles, courtesy of our guides Agnieszka Wojciechowska-Sej and Maja Pawlikowska, we saw the exhibition “City of fashion machine”.
• We also went to the Museum of Art in connection with the 90th anniversary of the first opening to the public of the international collection of the a.r. group, which marked the beginning of the Museum. There, we saw the exhibitions ‘The Avant-garde Museum’ and ‘The Earth is Flat Again’ – on which we were shown around by Maria Wasińska-Stelmaszczyk and Jakub Gawkowski.

This extremely interesting programme was prepared especially for us by the MS Club together with Maja Wasińska from the Museum of Art in Łódź – thank you very much!

We entered the new year in the wonderful company of our many friends! For the 4th time, together with our partner Society of Friends of the Museum, we organised a weekend trip to Łódź in January.

On the first day, Friday, we went to the MS1 for the opening of Marek Sobczyk’s exhibition Prototypes 05: Marek Sobczyk. A Trip on the Wire [Polentransport] curated by Hanna Wróblewska, who showed us around the exhibition together with the artist. What is Marek Sobczyk’s latest exhibition about? While visiting the space of the exhibition “Prototypes 05: Marek Sobczyk. A Trip on the Wire [Polentransport]”, we follow the meandering installation which leads us to subsequent paintings. The structure made of 180 metres of galvanized wire is an artistic tribute to Katarzyna Kobro. The work is part of Marek Sobczyk’s long-term project “Museum” (in inverted commas!), under which the artist enters into a dialogue with the works of such artists as: Magdalena Abakanowicz,  Stanisław Dróżdż,  James Joyce,  Jeff Koons,  Kazimir Malevich, and Roman Opałka. At the exhibition “A Trip on the Wire“.[Polentransport], the artist is in dialogue with Katarzyna Kobro, with Stanisław Lem’s “Solaris”, and with Joseph Beuys, at whose famous gift from 1981 he decides to look with a critical eye.

After a short break for Christmas and New Year, we are back to invite you, as a reminder of our visit to Teresa Gierzyńska’s exhibition “Women live for love”, to see it at the Zachęta Gallery.

What can we expect from the exhibition? The rich body of work of Teresa Gierzyńska (b. 1947), sculptor, photographer and graphic artist, still remains unknown to the general public. The large, monographic exhibition at the Zachęta, accompanied by an extensive publication, provides for the first time a full insight into the artist’s original work, situated at the intersection of various disciplines and media. The exhibition’s title is taken from Lauren Berlant’s book Female Complaint. The Unfinished Business of Sentimentality in American Culture (2008). It offers an excellent commentary on art that grew out of opposition to the images of femininity and stereotypes about the social role of women and their ideal lives as mediated by mass culture.

The exhibition will be open until 6 March. At the same time, you can see Teresa Gierzyńska’s exhibition “Pause” in the friendly Gunia Nowik Gallery!

Despite various challenges, it was a great year! We caught every pandemic-free moment to be together and see exhibitions, picnic in front of Zacheta and ride our bikes. Many thanks to all the wonderful galleries, museums and artists who invited us! We didn’t manage to visit all of them and this is also why we are even more looking forward to the coming year!

But 2021 is not only about membership programmes. Together with Zacheta, for the second year, we are collaborating on a major project called “Open Zacheta”, implemented with European funds, which aims to digitise and disseminate the collection. We have also continued the 160/160 scholarship programme implemented on the occasion of the Society’s anniversary – another 36 artists have received scholarships!

In 2022 we are sure to encounter challenges too. But as an independent local government organisation, we will continue our programme of bringing contemporary art closer and disseminating it! Thanks to the patronage of Polfa Tarchomin we will implement the Ludwika of Lind Górecka scholarship awarded to Katarzyna Górna. Together with the Pamoja Foundation, we are developing the “Back to School” project, which aims to introduce the works of contemporary artists into Polish schools. And with our partner ngo – Towarzystwo Przyjaciół MSN – we will soon go on our traditional fourth January trip to Łódź!

Thank you for being us!

On 25 November, the opening day of the exhibition: “Between Collectivism and Individualism. The Japanese Avant-Garde in the 1950s and 1960s”, we had the pleasure of inviting members of the Society to an evening, intimate curatorial tour at Zachęta.
Maria Brewińska, curator of the title exhibition and earlier ones: “Gendai: Contemporary Art of Japan” and “Yayoi Kusama”, took us, not for the first time, on a journey to Japan. In the case of the latest exhibition, the avant-garde of the 1950s and 1960s turned out to be her topic of interest.

The works gathered at the exhibition, which we were able to see during the guided tour, belong to various media such as new painting, sculpture, installation, drawing, graphics, performance, photography and film. They reflect the dynamism and energy of art emerging in a unique period of socio-economic growth in Japan, which for the first time in its history joined the global processes of change. The country, devastated by war, was recovering at a dizzying pace, and an exceptional combination of circumstances created favourable conditions for numerous artistic activities in the 1950s.

The exhibition can be seen at Zachęta until 13 March 2022.

The trip of SEFA members to Dresden was full of valuable meetings, visits to art galleries and exhibitions, as well as walks along the Dresden architecture trail, including:

We went on a visit to the Gebr. Lehmann Gallery, where we saw, among other things, the exhibition “GlassPhone” (Tilman Hornig). We visited the exhibition “Johannes Vermeer. Vom Innehalten’, which shows, among other things, one of the most famous works of Dutch painting of the Golden Age, the painting “Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window”. We also met Susanne Altmann, an art historian living and working in Dresden, who showed us around the city and introduced us to the exhibition “Deutsches Design 1949-1989” in the Kunsthalle.

The main purpose of SEFA’s November trip to Dresden was to see Egidio Marzona’s collection at the Japanisches Palais, which the collector donated to the museum in Dresden. The Archiv der Avantgarden contains one of the most extensive collections of artworks, objects and documents of the artistic avant-garde of the 20th century. In two years’ time, the collection will be housed in a purpose-built pavilion.

On the example of the collection, which has been gathered since the end of the 1960s, one can trace the richness of artistic ideas, radical utopias, as well as surprising juxtapositions of artists’ works. We were able to see the collection in the company of Dr Przemysław Strożek – the curator of the collection, who deals with the history of the avant-garde, modernism and contemporary art on a daily basis.

On the first weekend of November we took SEFA’s members to Wroclaw and Dresden. The trip was full of encounters with art touching on difficult and important topics such as immigration, transsexuality and addiction to the digital world. We looked at art, creating a community for a good cause which, in these difficult times, is the promotion of culture.

On the first day, we visited Wrocław institutions, which showed us how strong the voice of NGOs is in Poland and how important, in promoting culture, are all grassroots initiatives, including a visit to 66P and a talk with Marek Puchała – co-creator of this extraordinary place; We had a meeting with Tobiasz Papuczys at the Grotowski Institute, we were shown around the Slavs and Tatars exhibition at Op Enheim and shown around the headquarters by director Kama Wróbel; we also visited the Krupa Gallery, which is being built in a historic building in Wrocław’s Market Square.

We are proud to announce that Dobromila Błaszczyk has joined the 160/160 Scholarship Committee for the next three months, from July to September.

Dobrusia is the founder and editor-in-chief of Contemporary Lynx art magazine, an English-language publication on Polish contemporary art. She is an art historian, curator and author of texts on art. She cooperates with institutions and art collectors from Poland and abroad by organising exhibitions and art fairs. She initiated the Allegro Prize competition for artists, the first edition of which took place in the difficult for artists pandemic year of 2020.

She has been a friend of Zacheta for many years, as well as a member of our Society. Thank you!

Galeria Studio invited two friendly Societies – the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and the Society of Friends of the Museum – for a guided tour of the exhibition “Trans 11.603”.

The exhibition features works by 10 artists met by the curator, Inés R. Artola, during her stay in Lima. The works were selected by the artists themselves. The title of the exhibition refers to the distance – so many kilometres separate Lima from Warsaw, and the common denominator is a portable memory. A pendrive. The USB Flash drive brought from Lima was only opened in Poland. The exhibition is an experiment combining trust and luck, a mosaic of sensitivity, formats and techniques that has no common theme, style or other limitations.

Agata Nowosielska is one of the artists in the collection of the newly opened Nomus Art Museum in Gdańsk, but her works, as part of the exhibition ‘Nirvana’, can also be seen in Warsaw at the Stolarska/Krupowicz Gallery.

During the guided tour, to which we were invited, the artist told us about the cycle of over 30 oil compositions and collages which she has created over the last 2 years and about her vision of nirvana.

The title nirvana is – apart from its critical assumption – an affirmation of transience, a tribute to excess, vibrancy, colours, but also a criticism of media and the crowd of images. Nowosielska has created a world out of images of the iconosphere that we know very well and which surround us from all sides, as well as out of fragments of everyday existence. However, this created world does not lack the grotesque and contradictions; entropy opposed to life, excess and multiplication confronted with emptiness and asceticism of expression. The series was presented at the Centre for Contemporary Art Łaźnia in Gdańsk.

Archive of Public Protests, Krzysztof Maniak, Jana Shostak, Mikołaj Sobczak and Weronika Wysocka – these are this year’s finalists in the most important competition for young artists in Poland: Views.

Emphasising support for artists rather than competition, the organisers decided not to award a main prize. All nominees will be equally honoured. The competition, which for nearly two decades has presented the most significant phenomena in Polish art at the time, will be held for the last time this year.

The 10th jubilee edition of Views will be exceptional in many ways. This year there will be no traditional gala, nor will there be a competition exhibition. Views 2021 will take the form of a public programme prepared jointly with the artists. The audience will be able to take part in excursions, workshops and performative actions.

For more information about this year’s Views and the finalists, visit: https://zacheta.art.pl/pl/spojrzenia

curator: Magdalena Komornicka
nominating committee: Michał Grzegorzek, Magdalena Komornicka, Marta Kudelska, Piotr Lisowski, Ada Piekarska, Michalina Sablik, Gabriela Warzycka-Tutak
Partner: Deutsche Bank Polska
Co-financed by the Ministry of Culture, National Heritage and Sport

On 7 October, an exhibition by a Norwegian artist connected to Poland, Hege Lønne, opened at Zachęta. SEFA’s members could not miss the opening.

The exhibition presents sculptures, installations, video works and documentation of artistic activities from different periods of her career. The exhibition is complemented by unpublished photographs of Warsaw – colour slides from the transformation period of the 1980s and 1990s – and animated films. The oldest works in the exhibition – sculptures made in Norway and Poland in the 1980s – are the result of experimentation with both the material and medium of sculpture.

The exhibition will run until 6 February 2022.

We are pleased to recommend the exhibition”In these days of tumult, heat and dazzle I retreat in my mind” at the Stefan Gierowski Foundation, which can be seen for just a few more days.

As part of the exhibition, its curators Michalina Sablik and Kamil Pierwszy decided to take a closer look at young Polish painting. They invited over thirty artists whose painting does not engage in criticism or irony towards social reality, and is far from post-artistic and activist tendencies. The collected paintings from recent years refer visually and thematically to Symbolist, Surrealist, Expressive or Decadent trends. However, the artists combine historical references with contemporary motifs from the world of games, TV series or pop culture, treated in a post-ironic and emotional way. The individual paintings create hybrid, oneiric, dreamy worlds. The works show a clear interest in such themes as mythology, fairy tales, vanitas, magic and psychedelia.

The second day of the WGW 2021 weekend was full of artistic impressions. Together with the Society of Friends of the Museum we went on a bus trip to places a bit more distant on the map of Warsaw. In between the sightseeing, we had lunch in the beautiful garden of Le Guern Gallery.

Among the galleries and exhibitions we visited were: Puro Hotels, Death of a Man, Fort Photography Institute, Magnetic Fields, Szydłowski Gallery, Foksal Gallery Foundation, Heart of a Man Gallery, East Gallery, Raster, Le Guern Gallery

The next edition of Warsaw Gallery Weekend (30.09-3.10.2021), with two days of meetings with contemporary art – visits to galleries and meetings with artists and exhibition curators – is already over.

The first day of the gallery tours was marked by a bicycle and walking excursion organised together with the friendly Society of Friends of the Museum.

Among the galleries visited were: Piktogram, Hos Gallery, Leto Gallery, Asymetria, Galeria Szara, Propaganda, Polana Institute, Gunia Nowik Gallery, Galeria Esta, Rodriguez Gallery, Jednostka Gallery

Yesterday we invited members of the Association for the Encouragement of Fine Arts to the Warsaw Chapter of Association of Polish Artists and Designers for a curatorial tour, by Agnieszka Rayzacher, of the exhibition “Magda Moskwa. Sometimes I am overwhelmed with peace”.

The exhibition is related to the Jan Cybis Award received by the artist in October 2020. This prize, established by the Chapter of Association of Polish Artists and Designers, according to the regulations may only be awarded to a living artist, whose work is characterised by originality and artistic individualism. Since the creation of the prize in 1973, it has been awarded to women only 7 times. Magda Moskwa works in painting, sculpture, photography, embroidery and creates non-utilitarian objects-clothes. In painting, she started from the image of a human being who was an embodiment of the psychic layer, of emotional states. Her approach has evolved from meticulously elaborated images, striking with their verisimilitude of representation, in which her fascination with 15th century Dutch painting, votive art and coffin portraiture was palpable, to the most recent paintings and sculptures bordering on abstract representations.

The trip to Lublin also included a visit to the studio of artist Magdalena Franczak, which is located in the Słowackiego housing estate designed by Oskar and Zofia Hansen in the early 1960s.

The artist told us about her recent and current projects, the history of choosing the place for her studio and allowed us to look at her works up close. The unusual afternoon culminated in a walk around the estate of the famous architects.

Magdalena Franczak (born in 1978) – an interdisciplinary artist using various media: painting, drawing, photography, performance. Creates objects and works with site-specific space. She engages in dialogues with theatre, designing costumes and set designs. In his artistic practice, he tries to redefine the existing order, giving forms new meanings. By merging forms taken out of reality, he creates a story about a utopian world in which each voice can resound with equal force without drowning out the other.

During SEFA’s visit to the Biała Gallery we met with its director Anna Nawrot, thanks to whom we got to know the history and colourful stories from the life of the institution and had the opportunity to look into almost every nook and cranny of the gallery and take a behind-the-scenes look at the exhibition “The Tower of Women²”.

“The Tower of Women²”, featuring only female artists, symbolically refers to the exhibition entitled “The Tower of Women”. “It was the third exhibition organised in 1985, in the first year of the existence of Biała Gallery in Lublin.

Young Polish artists participated in it: Renata Boguszewska, Ewa Ciepielewska, Bożena Grzyb-Jarodzka, Urszula Kłoczowska, Krystyna Kutyna, Irena Nawrot, Anna Płotnicka, Małgorzata Rysz, Danuta Wierzbicka and Anna Nawrot – the director of Biała Gallery.

The trip to Lublin coincided with the opening of the latest exhibition “Mame-Loshn” at the Labyrinth Gallery. We could not miss it. The exhibition “Mame-Loshn” deals with a language which was formed in constant movement, without its own territory. Yiddish, the “mother” language, remains in close relation with the sphere of everyday life and the human inner world. This places it, as it were, in opposition to the “mother” language which reflects power relations.

In March, after a two-year break, the Lublin Castle, which houses the National Museum in Lublin, reopened to visitors. Being in Lublin, we could not miss the opportunity to see the newly created permanent exhibition “The Castle and Avant-garde Group”. It features works by Lublin-based avant-garde artists, which are the hallmark of the museum.

The core of the exhibition, which was shown to us by its curator, Marcin Lachowski, is a presentation of the work of an avant-garde artistic group active in the second half of the 1950s in Lublin, whose name is associated with the Lublin castle – a place of the first meetings of young artists. The gallery reflects the most important tropes of modern and neo-avant-garde art related to the artistic life of Lublin, which presents in relation to the work of the classics of the Polish post-war avant-garde.

Thus, the exhibition features works by leading representatives of the Zamek Group – Jan Ziemski, Włodzimierz Borowski, Tytus Dzieduszycki, alongside those by Tadeusz Rolke, Wojciech Fangor or Andrzej Wróblewski.

The vernissage and meeting with the artist Jakub Ciężki, a curator tour by Paulina Olszewska and a dinner with members of the Association for the Encouragement of Fine Arts – this is how we started the autumn artistic season and the first day of the Association’s stay in Lublin.

“The Triumph of Abstraction”, Jakub Ciężki’s exhibition and the first point of our programme in Lublin, presents the artist’s pictures which seem to confirm that the abstract painting tradition is a constant source of inspiration and reinterpretation. It is also a personal manifestation for the artist, informing about the end of his earlier painting search and the beginning of a completely new chapter in his artistic work.

This year’s edition of NOT FAIR, the Exhibition of Contemporary Art from Private Collections, has begun.

Together with the friendly Society of Friends of the Museum, we had the pleasure of participating in a curatorial tour organised by Michał Woliński and Marta Kołakowska, the directors of this year’s event.

This year’s exhibition follows on from the 2005 presentation ‘Potential. Contemporary Art Collections for the Museum…’. However, it is not so much a broad overview of the resources of Polish private collections, but rather focuses on the works of mainly young, but already established, Polish artists.

At the exhibition dedicated to young Polish contemporary art, visitors can admire works by some twenty artists, on loan from over a dozen private collections. Among them are works by Zuza Golińska, Agata Ingarden, Alicja Kwade, Goshka Macuga, Agnieszka Polska, Daniel Rycharski and Iza Tarasewicz. We will find here sculptures, installations, objects, as well as videos, documentations and performances.

At the invitation of the POLIN Friends Club, we visited the extremely important exhibition “Wilhelm Sasnal: Such a Landscape”. This is a must-see exhibition for all lovers of the artist’s work and the first such large exhibition in Poland since the one in Zachęta Gallery in 2007!

Alongside Sasnal’s already iconic works there are also brand new paintings created earlier this year. The artist masterfully uses visual contexts and images that are present in the public consciousness to draw his personal portrait of the Polish landscape, in which the memory of the Holocaust is present.

When asked why the Jewish theme, and especially the theme of the Holocaust, is so important to him, he answers that this is due to the feeling of absence that accompanies him and is difficult to define. The exhibition leaves us with an important message about the importance, for our memory, of a personal approach to our history.

This is a must-see exhibishion and thank you for the invitation!

This is not the end of our Tricity encounters with art! Saturday afternoon brought just as many artistic impressions as the morning. Together with Tomek Kopcewicz, one of the residents of the Artists’ Colony in 2001-2008, we went for a walk around the shipyard. Tomek – painter, video artist, sailor and resident of Gdansk at the same time – showed us around the artistic studios and galleries, enriching our walk with numerous anecdotes.

For those of you who are going to visit Tricity in the near future, we recommend especially Agata Nowosielska’s exhibition “Nirvana” in the Centre for Contemporary Art Łaźnia. We managed to meet Agata and curator Jolanta Woszczenko, who personally showed us around the exhibition. Through a series of over 30 oil compositions and collages created over the last two years, the artist presents us with her vision of nirvana, proposing a path through imagination. Hurry – you can only see the exhibition until 1 August!

Our stay in the Tricity turned out to be a great opportunity to take a look into the creation of a branch of the National Museum in Gdańsk – NOMUS New Art Museum in Gdańsk. We went there on Saturday morning at the invitation of Aneta Szyłak, director of the Museum, in whose company we visited the building and talked about the idea of creating a new institution on the artistic map of Gdańsk and its plans for the future. It was a really engaging discussion.

The opportunity to visit this place already now is a real privilege for members of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts – the official opening is not scheduled until October this year!

PS We have particularly fond memories of Węgielek, whose appearance brought a lot of joy among the Society’s members and, thanks to some unusual coincidence, proved that those who love animals, also love art.

During a trip to Gdańsk and Sopot, on the first weekend of July, we visited cultural institutions, artists’ studios, a sculpture park, and met with curators, collectors and artists. Numerous conversations about art, the role of cultural institutions and memories of excellent exhibitions followed. “From Black Mountain College to Pop Art. Postwar American Art and Documents from the Archiv der Avantgarden” at the State Gallery in Sopot – was the first exhibition we had the opportunity to see. We saw it in the company of collector Egidio Marzona and curator Przemysław Strożek, who showed us around the exhibition on Friday afternoon. “From Black Mountain College to Pop Art” shows the post-war artistic transformation in the United States based on part of the collection of the Archiv der Avantgarden in Dresden.

The works selected for the exhibition in Sopot are an important testimony to the innovative artistic practices initiated in the 20th century on the other side of the Atlantic. The artists whose works can be seen at the exhibition include: Andy Warhol, Josef Albers, Carl Andre, Lawrence Weiner, Cy Twombly, Dick Higgins, Allan Kaprow, Dan Flavin, Bill Bollinger, Dorothea Rockburne, Carolee Schneemann or Robert Indiana.

Where else did we go during our stay in the Tricity? You will find out in the following postings, in which, in the form of a short report, we publish another portion of memories from the trip.

This is how it was last weekend on Małachowskiego Square in front of Zachęta! “Living the Feminist Life” – a programme created by Magdalena Komornicka, Liliana Zeic (Piskorska) and Agnieszka Różyńska – consists of four days of meetings, creating a place to build relationships, be with each other, listen to each other’s stories in a safer space. There are many more interesting events and attractions waiting for us at the Square this summer, which are worth following at https://zacheta.art.pl/pl/wystawy/plac-malachowskiego-2021.

This is because Zachęta is not only great exhibitions and a rich educational programme, but also a meeting place, a place of dialogue, a place that unites rather than divides. This year, artists and educators will return to the square in front of Zachęta to create a safe, open and accessible space for everyone under Marek Sobczyk’s “Simple Rainbow”. Come to Małachowskiego Square!

Yesterday we visited the studio of the artist Marcin Jasik, situated in a picturesque location and a beautiful garden. The opportunity to meet the artist at his studio was a real pleasure – a chance to talk to him and find out about the sources of his inspiration, but also to see works which will remain unknown to the rest of the world for some time to come. Marcin Jasik (born in 1990) is a graduate of the Faculty of Painting at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. He defended his diploma in Professor Cieśniewski’s studio and specialised in sculpture under Professor J. Łęcki. Marcin Jasik’s paintings are a constant search for the language of painting, artistic language which changes under the influence of inspiration or his own experiences. A free, intuitive expression is visible in his works. He experiments with the texture of paint, canvas or matter painting. Apart from painting, the artist also works with photography and sculpture. Thank you very much for the invitation!

“On those who enter the same rivers, ever different waters flow” – This is the title of an exhibition by Konrad Żukowski at Clay Warsaw, which, together with members of the Society of Friends of the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, we were pleased to see last weekend!

At this short, because only 4-day-long (24-27.06) exhibition at Clay Warsaw we had the unique opportunity to see the latest, large-format works of the Krakow artist. The event, initiated and organized by Tomasz Pasiek at Clay Warsaw, is the 2nd monographic presentation of Żukowski canvases in Warsaw and the opportunity to look at new creative tasks, which the artist set before himself.

On a hot Thursday afternoon, we found shelter in the majestic and… pleasantly cool interiors of the National Museum, where we went at the invitation of the friendly Hestia Artistic Travel Foundation, to see the exhibition “Different Perspectives Dutch and Flemish Painting from the ERGO Hestia Collection”. The exhibition will present paintings by 17th-century Dutch and Flemish masters on loan from the ERGO Hestia Insurance Company. This is the only corporate collection of Old Masters paintings in Poland, never before shown to the public. The exhibition will be supplemented by selected works from the National Museum in Warsaw. On display there are 52 works by eminent artists, such as Salomon van Ruysdael, David Teniers the Younger, Jan Porcellis, Gabriel Metsu, and Jan Breughel the Younger. We were shown around the exhibition by its curator, Aleksandra Janiszewska. The exhibition, which includes a number of accompanying events, can be seen until 25 July. We heartily recommend and thank you for the invitation!

Belonging to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts entails participating in many truly exceptional events! It was no different last Saturday, when we visited Mikołaj Chylak’s exhibition ‘I don’t know who told me this story’, located in two spaces – the Exhibition Bureau in Warsaw and the Zofia and Wacław Nałkowski Museum in Wołomin. The title of the exhibition refers to the process of forgetting and then the return of the forgotten. The idea behind this project emerged last year, during the first summer of the pandemic. We were shown around the exhibition in the Exhibition Bureau by the curator Anna Łazar and Mikołaj Chylak. At the Museum in Wołomin they were joined by Ada Rączka and Natan Kryszk, whose works accompany Mikołaj Chylak’s painting and interventions at the exhibition. And because in the Society we value the company of others, we ended our trip with a picnic on the grass! The sunny, June weather and the beautiful, green garden in front of the Museum encouraged us to interact together in this way. Many thanks to the Exhibitions Bureau and the Zofia and Wacław Nałkowski Museum!

What a weekend it was! Loosening the restrictions also means a return to the out-of-town excursions of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts and the possibility of communing with art on weekends as well!

We spent Sunday afternoon at the Oczyszczalnia Miejsce – an unusual place with a unique atmosphere not far from Warsaw. Anna Myca, painter and co-owner of the place, invited us to her studio located in the area of the Oczyszczalnia Miejsce, whose scenery consists of meadows, ponds and trees.

Anna Myca was born in 1966, in Świdwin. In 1991 she obtained a diploma (with honours) in the atelier of S. Gierowski, at the Faculty of Painting of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. She supplemented this diploma with an appendix on wall painting under the supervision of E. Tarkowski. Since the beginning of her artistic activity, she has been creating in wall techniques (fresco and sgraffito), as well as painting on natural equipment, such as wardrobe or table tops.

Oczyszczalnia Miejsce that she runs is an extraordinary place where art meets nature. On site, in addition to a visit and guided tour of the artist’s studio, members of the Society enjoyed lunch from the unique, locally run kitchen and a moment of relaxation amidst the greenery in which the Oczyszczalnia Miejsce is immersed.

Many thanks for the invitation!

For the first guided tour in June, at the special invitation of Galeria Studio, we went to the exhibition “Out of Joint”, which is currently on-going there. Members of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts were taken on a tour by the Gallery’s curator, Paulina Olszewska, who not only told us about the artists and their works selected for the exhibition, but also explained where the idea came from! The works collected in the exhibition refer to the disappearance of social ties – or to attempts to rebuild them in circumstances which do not favour spontaneous communication between people and the development of everyday relations based on trust. During the exhibition, we have the opportunity to look at this change in two contexts: in Poland after 1981 and in Egypt after the failure of the so-called Arab Spring. You can see the exhibition until 18 July. We encourage you to visit it and thank you once again for the invitation!

It was today that the long-awaited new exhibition at Zachęta Gallery – “Cold Revolution” – was opened! On this occasion, we invited members of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts to a pre-premiere, morning curatorial tour through the exhibition, during which we were the first to hear about how the idea for the exhibition was born, as well as to talk to its creators and curators. “Cold Revolution” is the result of the collaboration of curators: Joanna Kordjak and Jérôme Bazin, as well as leading cultural institutions from the Czech Republic, France, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland. It shows the social revolution of the 1950s through painting, photography, film, design and architecture (over 400 works from six countries of the former Eastern Bloc: Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary). The exhibition is open from 27.05-19.09. You are warmly welcome!

We are happy to announce that we have a new member of committee “160/160”. She is Agnieszka Adam!

Agnieszka is a contemporary art enthusiast. She graduated from postgraduate studies “History of Art. Interpretations” and “Contemporary Art. Knowledge and market”. By profession she is a legal adviser specialising in intellectual property law and advertising law. She is responsible for regulatory and legal issues in the interactive media sales house Mediafarm. He participates in the works of the legal group of the Association of Internet Industry Employers IAB Poland. She has been dealing with oil painting for a dozen or so years and has already held several exhibitions. She is passionate about travelling, especially in Asia.

A special meeting took place on Thursday evening, with artist Malwina Konopacka, invited by Glenfiddich, the event’s organiser. The invited guests were the first to see the artist’s latest work – a modern, minimalist piece combining a metal structure with ceramic elements, donated to the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts during the event. In a few months, in October this year, the work will be auctioned off at Desa Unicum, with the entire proceeds going to support the “160/160” programme. This project, initiated in the year celebrating 160 years of TZSP, is aimed at female and male artists from Zachęta’s collection, and the artists nominated by the jury receive funding for their creative work! We would like to thank the Glenfiddich brand for organising the meeting and the joint gesture of support for the artist and Glenfiddich shown to the Society.

On Wednesday evening, members of the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts had the pleasure of taking part in a unique meeting with Katarzyna Kozyra. The artist showed us around her exhibition ‘Model World’, in which she returns to her role as a sculptor, working with this medium for the first time since Animal Pyramid. Created especially for the exhibition at the Institute of Industrial Design, the installation consists of several hundred objects used by the artist in her projects, becoming an unusual summary of Kozyra’s creative output of the last 25 years. The exhibition features over 250 original objects used by Katarzyna Kozyra in her most famous projects, including Olimpia, Łaźnia, Łaźnia męska, Kara i zbrodnia. These are the last days of the exhibition, which can be seen at the Institute of Industrial Design only until next Sunday 23 May inclusive!

We like such weekends! Great exhibitions in good company behind us – the company of TZSP! And here you can see some pictures from the May weekend in Muranów at Leto Gallery and Pamoja Foundation!

A while after museums and galleries reopened to the public, we recommenced our visits to friendly art institutions.

Last Friday, at the invitation of the Stefan Gierowski Foundation, we saw the exhibition: “Confrontations and Arguments. Modern Art According to the Assumptions of the Krzywe Koło Gallery”.

The Krzywe Koło Gallery existed between 1956-65, in Warsaw, and was the first of its kind in Poland. It organised several individual exhibitions, including Konfrontacje 1960 (Confrontations 1960), and was an active centre of artistic life of national importance. Led by Marian Bogusz, it was the only modern art gallery at the time to promote new formal and ideological solutions.

We were shown around the exhibition by Prof. Janusz Zagrodzki, who was also responsible for the concept and arrangement of the exhibition – thank you very much! The exhibition is open until 20 June.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

On Thursday, preceding the final weekend of the excellent exhibition “Henryk Streng/Marek Włodarski and Jewish-Polish Modernism”, we were invited by the partner Society of Friends of the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw for an exclusive guided tour of the exhibition at the Museum on the Vistula River.

Streng/Włodarski developed an original take on Modernism, before becoming a rather unorthodox Socialist–Realist. Streng / Włodarski drew on Polish–Jewish culture, was a Holocaust survivor and continued to maintain an identity rooted in genocide.

Tracing a path through his life and works, this exhibition offers insight into artistic phenomena that were of crucial significance to Central and Eastern Europe before, during and after the Second World War.We would like to thank the Society of Friends of the Museum for the invitation and remind you that the exhibition can only be seen until tomorrow, the 16th of May – hurry up, because it is really worth it!

Meanwhile, in Zachęta, intensive preparations are being made for the opening of the exhibition “Cold Revolution”, which will show a different perspective on the art of the 1950s. More information coming soon!

Members of the Society, thanks to a special invitation, were able to visit the exhibition of Norbert Delman “A posteriori” at the Art Pavilion of the Foundation “Artystyczna Podróż Hestii”. The exhibition takes the form of a site specific, the artist‘s works can also be viewed through the shutters of the Pavilion glass at any time of the day.
For 19 years, the Foundation has been implementing the Hestia Artistic Journey competition, aimed at young artists. The artist and curator Maja Wolniewska told us about his work and exhibition.
Norbert Delman (born 1989) is a sculptor and performer, creator of video, installation and graphics, and curator of exhibitions. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in the studio of Mirosław Bałka, and also studied fine arts at Falmouth University College (UK). He is a co-creator of the Stroboskop art space in Warsaw and a finalist of the 13th edition of the Hestia Artistic Journey Competition.

The Society organized a meeting with Joanna Rajkowska on her solo exhibition “Rhizopolis” in Zachęta– National Gallery of Art. The artist invited us for a tour of the exhibtion and later for a discussion, thanks to which we had the opportunity to hear about the backstage of works and other projects that the artist carried out in public space, as well as about her plans for the future.

Rhizopolis is a set design built for a futuristic film. His scenario outlined by Rajkowska is a proposal of radical dependence, in which the hitherto man-dominated nature turns out to be in its unmoved rescue, providing what is necessary to sustain human life. Visiting the exhibition, we enter the area of both the art installation and the set design for the film in which we play ourselves, and to which perhaps we will write sequels.

The Society organized the first curatorial tour this year on the exhibition “Sculpture in search of a place” specially for our members.
The curator of the exhibition Anna Maria Leśniewska guided us through the exhibition which tells about the identity of polish sculpture of the last sixty years — not so much through the chronology of artistic activity, but by showing phenomena and creative attitudes relevant to its development. The curator – in the form of an author‘s visual essay – managed to collect the works of nearly one hundred artists from the field of visual arts, m. in. Magdalena Abakanowicz, Xavier Dunikowski, Władysław Hasior, Alina Szapocznikow or Katarzyna Kozyra.
“Sculpture in search of a place” is another of a series of cross-cutting problem exhibitions in Zachęta, dedicated every year to another artistic medium.

Especially for members of the Society we organised a meeting with artists Bozena Grzyb – Jarodzka and Ewa Ciepelewska, creators of the LUXUS group, who received scholarships of the 160/160 program. They told the members of the Society about their current work, exhibitions and the latest issue of Art-Zin.
The artistic activity of Grzyb-Jarodzka is dominated by portraits. In the 1980s they were mainly images of friends and representatives of youth subcultures, as well as likenesses of idols of her generation. Based on her photographs, she also recreated hollywood portraits of cinematic characters in her own style. In her works, the artist uses a strong color scheme, which in combination with patterns covering the canvases can bring to mind psychedelic visions. In her work you can see the inspiration of pop art, onirism, romanticism and kitsch.

Ewa Cieplewska co-created the artistic group LUXUS – one of the key artistic groups of the 1980s in Poland. In addition to painting, he also creates involved happenings, murals and outdoor activities.

Members of the Society participated in an online meeting with Dorota Podlaska, a grantee of the “160/160” program. Born in 1968 in Bydgoszcz, she is a painter, graphic artist, photographer, author of actions and interventions in space. She studied at the Faculty of Fine Arts at the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, graduating in 1989. His achievements include exhibitions such as His works have been exhibited at Zachęta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw, Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle in Warsaw, Arsenal Gallery in Białystok, Łaźnia Gallery in Gdańsk, study stays in Finland, France, Italy, South Korea, Japan. She told Society members about her projects, art, food and friendship.

We invited the Society members for a special private tour of the collection of the Studio Gallery in Warsaw. Dorota Jarecka, the gallery‘s manager, told us about the first exhibition of this outstanding art collection in a long time. When Józef Szajna took over the management of the Studio Theatre in 1972, he founded an art gallery there and bought the first works for collection. Today, the collection has thousands of objects, among them works m. in. Magdalena Abakanowicz, Edward Dwurnik, Edward Krasiński, Erna Rosenstein, Henryk Stażewski. The works of outstanding artists of Polish modernism are proof of the unusual artistic policy of this place, as well as innovative thinking about the interdisciplinary nature of modern cultural institutions.

At a special invitation, members of the Society visited Grzegorz Kozera’s exhibition “Re-seeing” in the aTak Gallery. The exhibition is a record of Grzegorz Kozera’s artistic journey along the Józef Czapski trail. which , in addition to personal insights and ideas, is also a reflection of the fascination with the visual sensitivity of Józef Czapski (1896-1993) – painter, writer, co-founder of the Paris “Culture” and the Paris Committee. In his footsteps, Kozera followed in South America in 2019 as part of the scholarship awarded to the “Young Poland” Program.

Warsaw Gallery Weekend 2020 will be different from the previous ones. 10. edition finds us in a new reality, altered by a pandemic that has hit the art community particularly hard. Taking every precaution, we will meet at the beginning of October at the jubilee edition of WGW, during which 29 galleries from Warsaw, Łódź, Poznań, Gliwice and Katowice will present over 100 Polish and foreign artists.

NOT FAIR has been taking place in Warsaw for several years now. But this year, for the first time they are held in the DESA Unicum seat, which decided to support contemporary art galleries by giving them its space. This year, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, most international trade fairs were cancelled or moved to the Internet. These Polish galleries, which are internationally active, therefore had no chance to show the latest and most interesting works of the artists they represent to experts and a wider audience. Hosted by the auction house, the galleries will be able to reach a local audience.

The retrospective of Urszula Broll’s paintings (1930-2020) at the Królikarnia is a story of many decades of life and work of this extraordinary and unjustly forgotten artist. She was a painter, an animator of the independent art scene, and a Buddhist. She actively shaped the post-war artistic avant-garde and the so called “new generation” of artists. catholic underground. The title atman (Sanskrit for spirit, breath) appeared in Broll’s work in 1967 and is associated with the activity of the Oneiron Group from Katowice. The exhibition has been prepared on the initiative of and in cooperation with the Katarzyna Kozyra Foundation.

Society members are invited to a meeting with one of the 160/160 scholarship recipients, Przemek Branas. The meeting will take place in Zachęta’s cinema room so that we can see fragments of the artist’s works on the big screen. Przemek Branas (born. 1987) is an author of performances, videos and installations. He graduated from the Faculty of Intermedia of the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow, and is currently a doctoral student at the University of Arts in Poznań. He is the 2nd prize winner of the 2017 Views competition.

Especially for the members of the Society we made it possible to see the exhibition the day before its official opening during the open hours. The artist and the exhibition curator Magdalena Komornicka was also present. The first comprehensive monographic exhibition of Joanna Piotrowska in Poland presents a selection of her works from the last few years. In her staged photographs and films, the artist focuses on exploring human relationships and their bodily expression. Her black-and-white, hand-made, gelatin-silver prints and films on 16mm film are more a record of performance or spectacle than a document. The title of the exhibition Zaduch was taken from one of Piotrowska’s first photographic series (2013-2014), with which she gained international recognition. Frowst. The airy, stuffy, musty air) brings to mind the dense air of an unventilated apartment, saturated with complicated family relations.

At the special invitation of collectors Piotr Bazylko and Tomasz Pasiek we invite you to Ewa Tatar’s curatorial tour around Martyna Czech’s solo exhibition. Martyna Czech (born. 1990) made her debut at the Bielska Jesień Painting Biennial in 2015 where she won the Grand Prix. Her works can be found in numerous private and institutional collections of contemporary art. As many as seven of her works have been purchased by the Museum of Modern Art for its collection. Although the artist is one of the most acclaimed painters of the young generation in Poland, the exhibition, entitled “Martyna Czech. Arouses Emotions” will be her first solo show in Warsaw. The event is organized by Clay. Warsaw as part of the Clay. ART.

Prepared specially for the Zachęta, Monika Sosnowska’s exhibition is the first such large monographic presentation of the artist’s oeuvre in Poland. It features the older works selected from her comprehensive output as well as more recent works focusing around new themes and inspirations. The exhibition fills the space of Zachęta’s seven main rooms in such a way as to facilitate tracing the conceptualisation and changes in the artist’s works created across a broad sculptural, architectural and technological context. Sosnowska’s art stems from the tradition of modernism which is reviewed and processed in a consistent manner.

July 17, 2020 at 7 PM (online)

During the meeting we will talk about the Society’s activity report in 2019 and plans regarding
the next half a year. We will hold a vote regarding the financial activity as well as the
Management’s (Board’s) graduation for 2019.
We encourage you to get acquainted with the documents before the general assembly.
The ones that will not be able to attend the meeting, can be represented by a proxy. The template
of the power of attorney can be found alongside the other documents.

THE SUGGESTED AGENDA

1. Greetings from the members of the Board;
2. Selecting the Chairman of the General Assembly, The Clerk and The Returning
Committee;
3. Preparation of the attendance list;
4. Introduction of the activity report of The Society for the Encouragement of Fine
Arts in 2019;
5. Introduction and discussion of the financial activity for 2019
6. Voting for acceptance of the financial activity for 2019
7. Voting for acceptance of the graduation for the Board for 2019
8. Introduction of the Audit Committee reports for 2019
9. Discussion of plans for the years of 2019-2022
10. Free applications

Zachęta – The National Art Gallery and other cultural institutions are closed. In these difficult
times, we invite you to participate in the specially made programme #ZachętaOnline.
In the programme:
● A performative project Scrolling the System, which is now available on Instagram
@galeria_zachetanowy projekt artystyczny na Instagramie, which also transforms into an
exhibition space. Artists look at how the virtual world satisfies the need for real
closeness. Scrolling the System created specially for this medium and its audience, we
recommend to everyone looking for answers for very current questions today: where are
we headed.
● A virtual walk through four exhibitions thanks to 3D technology: Videotapes. Early video
art (1965-1976), Andrzej Krauze. Flying lesson, Ahmed Cherkaoui in Warsaw. Polish-
Moroccan artistic relations (1955-1980) as well as Two arts are better than one.
● Virtual tours through the current exhibitions
● Online workshops for schools and for families with children
What do with your kids at home? The gallery has prepared a special program of online

workshops. Building bases, drawing, totem making – and these are only some of the
propositions. We invite you to join the fun!
● Online magazine
Which will regularly be presenting the gallery’s resources – texts, exhibitions, pieces
from the collections, documents, and publications.
● The gallery has a rich selection of resources online. You can go back to your favorite
exhibition and listen to the curatorial tour or to an interesting lecture. For the youngest
ones we have animations from the cycle Share art! From the available events – a tour in
PJM. We encourage you to revisit your favorite exhibitions through a video documentary.

More information on www.zachetaonline.pl i www.zacheta.art.pl
Stay up to date, and stay with us!

We cordially invite you for the specially organized meeting for members of the Society with the
director Hanna Wróblewska, and her curatorial tour around the exhibition “Andrzej Krauze.
Flying Lesson”. In Poland Krauze is known mainly as a satiric creator, who has been
collaborating in the 70’s with the Parisian “Culture”. However the exhibition focuses on a
different period of creation, showcasing all original drawings created during the 30 year
collaboration of the artist with the British newspaper “The Guardian”. By concentrating on one
newspaper (chosen amongst many with which he worked) will not only help us take a closer look
at the versatility of drawing forms and change of style, but also help us notice the visual form
changes the newspaper went through as a medium.

A meeting at Aleksandra Jachtoma’s exhibition organized specially for the members of our
Society. During the last years the artist has been creating monochromatic paintings with minimal
intervention, consisting of additional parts painted on the edges of the rim, or on barely
noticeable value transitions. These are the things the artist mainly focuses on. Color subtlety,
delicacy connected with the format of paintings, a non-marking method of using oil paints,
harmonically changing the palette – everything that makes Jachtoma’s pieces ethereal beings,
however still making them memorable.

The exhibition at the Zachęta creates a new field of communicating and experiencing art. Iza Chlewińska (mum of five-year-old Miłosz) will focus on communication through movement and touch. She will stimulate our senses with a performative installation featuring sensory objects developed with a special focus on the youngest viewers (0-3 years of age). Jaśmina Wójcik and her daughters Zoya and Lea will invite the audience to build bases together using safe, natural materials. The gallery space will be filled with hiding places made of blankets, with survival structures erected in the open air, with no restrictions imposed. They will encourage viewers to join them in a return to nature and find inspiration for family games. Zbigniew Rogalski and his son Tymon will create a work inspired by reading together. The installation “In Search of Lost Time” will take viewers to the epicentre of a snowstorm made of thousands of letters, the smallest particles of all books read and unread. Tymon will also create a gallery of portraits of very important people who – during the exhibition – may be joined by other familiar faces. This time made by the other exhibition participants. And Olaf Brzeski and his son Konstanty will join forces to create a sculpture installation. Kinga Nowak with her son Titus will prepare a large-format abstract game inspired by Minecraft, inviting all visitors to play.

We cordially invite you to a meeting specially for members of the Society with Michał Jachuła
the curator of the exhibition. The exhibition will feature work created in the second half of the
60’s until the first half of the 70’s. XX century. It is the history of the earliest stage of video-art
showcased through the most basic format associated with this field – one channel moving
pictures, registered on videotapes (on a magnetic carrier). The Sony Portapak camera – mobile
and available – quickly became a new tool for artists’ creations. At the exhibition we can see the
work of Bruce Nauman, Nam June Paik and John Baldessari.

A curatorial tour around the exhibition was organized specially for members of our Society.
Ahmed Cherkaoui – considered a pioneer of moroccan contemporary art – at the beginning of the
60’s he studied in Warsaw’s Academy of Fine Arts. The time he spent in Poland turned out to be
pivotal in his painting career, preparing for later experiments in the area of abstract art. At the
exhibition we will be seeing: paintings from Erna Rosenstein, Henryk Stażewski, and Roman
Artymowski.

Change the Setting. Polish Theatrical and Social Set Design of the 20th and 21st Centuries is the fourth review exhibition devoted to theatrical set design in the history of Zachęta. Its concept was born out of the original vision of Robert Rumas, a respected visual artist and set designer. The curator and his team of collaborators lead the viewers through 100 years of history, building the narrative of the exhibition according to an issue and theme-based layout and creating contextual references to earlier and later phenomena.

The exhibition presents the latest paintings by Radek Szlaga, which were created as a result of his study of the language of the painting medium, underestimated narratives and relations between art, information and knowledge. Today, these interests gain new meaning and context.

Szlaga has often been called a postmodernist by critics. Postmodernism — as a lack of faith in the existence of a neutral evaluation of facts, phenomena and attitudes — is often considered to be one of the sources of a post-truth, cynical attitude towards facts. This is related to access to a huge amount of information (sometimes conflicting) and the erosion of authority of experts and scientific research. These days, the effectiveness of a message is not dependent on its verifiability, but on the number of ‘emotional’ reactions that translate into views, shares and likes. As a result, information sources are equalised in terms of their seriousness and reliability. In the artist’s latest works, travellers’ boasts, drunken stories and news offered by the so-called mainstream media gain similar import and cognitive value.

In 1972, in a manifesto “Postawa transformująca” (Transformative Attitude) Natalia LL wrote: “Art is in the process of becoming in every instant of reality: to the individual every fact, every second is fleeting and unique. That is why l record common and trivial events like eating, sleeping, copulation, resting, speaking etc”. These are the words of a young artist fascinated with new art – conceptualism, which not only rejected object as a fetish but, most importantly, it entered non-artistic areas at the same time giving up on gesture, afflatus, and artistry. For Natalia LL and artists, who co-created PERMAFO group with her (Andrzej Lachowicz, Zbigniew Dłubak and Antoni Dzieduszycki) the best means of realization of these postulates were photography and later also film.

On the weekend of 6-7 July we took a trip to Toruń to see Marina Abramowic’s exhibition “To the Pure”. This is a cross-sectional exhibition devoted to the work of Marina Abramović – an artist active for about five decades, an icon of performance and an extraordinary figure in the world of contemporary art. We also took part in a guided tour of the Nicolaus Copernicus University campus led by Paweł Kołacz and in a guided tour of Jacqueline Livingston’s exhibition “In the Shadow of Feminism. On the fringes of American art in the 1960s. i 70. We also met in Ark Parasite’s flat in Bydgoski Przedmieście, visited the Studio and the Interspecies Room.

This time, on a special invitation, we will visit the art studio of Ryszard Woźniak in Wiązowna near Warsaw. A painter, performer, songwriter, educator in the years 1976-1981, he studied at the Faculty of Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in the studio of Professor Stefan Gierowski. In 1982-1988 he lectured on painting technology at his alma mater. From 1982 to 1992 he co-founded the most important artistic formation of the 80 s – Gruppa. Since 1992, he has been running a painting studio at the Department of Art and Plastic Arts at the University of Zielona Góra. Three of his paintings are in the Zachęta collection.

Views is the most important competition in Poland addressed to artists who are young, but already present on the Polish art scene. Organised continuously on a biannual basis since 2003, it showcases the most interesting phenomena on the art scene. It was initiated by two institutions: Zachęta — National Gallery of Art and Deutsche Bank Polska, which have been carrying out this project together to this day. The aim of the competition is to honour outstanding attitudes on the young artistic scene, but it is not addressed to debut artists. Nominated artists must already have some achievements to their name which is why age limit was set at 36 years. The competition is held in two stages. The artists participating in the competition are selected by a nomination committee, and the winners — during the exhibition at Zachęta — by an international jury.

At the invitation of the Society of Friends of the National Museum in Warsaw, we invite you to Ewa Ziembińska’s tour of the exhibition of August Zamoyski’s Masterpiece.

The presented collection of August Zamoyski was purchased in 2019 for the National Museum in Warsaw. This is an exceptional collection: it gathers outstanding sculptures – the work of one of the best Polish sculptors of the twentieth century – and is representative of its entire work. The fate of the collection reflects the turbulent biography of its creator.

Thanks to the cooperation with the POLIN Friends Club, we invite you to a meeting with the main curator of POLIN collections, Dr. Renata Piątkowska in the conservation workshop. The Museum of the History of Polish Jews has a rich and diverse collection of over three thousand exhibits related to Jewish heritage. The collection consists of objects with unique artistic and historical value, including works by contemporary artists. We will see some valuable acquisitions in the Museum’s collection, which are not exhibited and available to visitors.

The exhibition of Włodzimierz Pawlak’s works in the space for art, see his works from the collection. We will see on it, among others Journals, Art Notes, Color History and Flies. Włodzimierz Pawlak (born in 1957) – painter, performer and poet. Co-founder and member of GRUPPA, and in 2017 the laureate of the. Jan Cybis. Pawlak’s works from the first half of the 1980 s were deeply rooted in socio-political issues. After this work, return to theoretical reflection, analysis of form, color, texture

“Friend of a Friend” is a gallery-share initiative launched in 2018 with editions in Warsaw and Berlin. This year’s Warsaw edition will involve nine most-active galleries based in Poland’s capital (BWA Warszawa, Foksal Gallery Foundation, LETO, Piktogram, Pola Magnetyczne, Dawid Radziszewski, Raster, Stereo and Wschód), who will share their exhibition spaces with sixteen international gallery guests (from Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the United States). One of the aims of the project is to create a different model for the presentation of contemporary art, to establish new networks within the Polish art scene and to enable local audiences to interact with the works of international artists, whose works were often not exhibited in Poland so far

Marek Sobczyk (born 1955) – painter, graphic artist, art theoretician and educator. He graduated from the studio of Stefan Gierowski, in the years 1982 – 1992 he was a member of the legendary GRUPPA. In 2012, he received the. Jan Cybis. The Year of sculpture project considers six (vertical) cultural types, rites, showing an escape from the sculpture understood sociotechnical in six other than the sculpture of space, convention. Each of the six spatial works is accompanied by two paintings.

Millions of spreads, 16 language versions, several hundred authors of photographs, three basic editions, two of which were published almost continuously from 1954 to 1989 (version for the West) and 1990 (version for the East) — that is the impressive picture of the Poland monthly in numbers. The monthly, although it also functioned in a limited scope in a Polish language version, was intended primarily for foreign readers — both in Western Europe and Eastern Bloc countries, as well as in the United States, Africa, Asia, and for a short time, even in Cuba. Its aim was to show Poland to the outside, beyond the borders of the country, with the use of a specific strategy based on an attractive graphic design and photography understood as a fully-fledged form of expression.

The puppet’s vast potential as a vehicle of artistic expression was discovered by Avant-Garde artists at the beginning of the twentieth century. Long regarded as an inferior genre, akin to street theatre or circus, puppet theatre made it possible to undo the sharp distinction between low- and high-brow culture, between children’s theatre, stereotyped as something marginal and not really serious, and ‘true’ art. On the one hand, puppet theatre opened up a new, attractive space for formal experimentation; on the other, it could be used to convey a socio-political message.

The exhibition is a collection of over one hundred photographic objects made jointly by Hanna Rechowicz and Jan Smaga.

She recalls the history of the house at Lekarska street in Warsaw, where the artist still lives today. House – work in the process – shaped from the early 1950 s by the marriage of artists Gabriel and Hanna Rechowicz, after the death of Rechowicz nurtured and developed by his wife. The meeting at the Zachęta exhibition will be preceded by a visit to the artist’s house at Lekarska street. After the meeting, we invite you for a coffee and cake.

Meeting with Marek Rachwalik and the director of the Trafostacja Sztuki in Szczecin, Stanisław Ruksza, at the artist’s individual exhibition. We will talk about the latest works as well as the loud exhibition presented at TRAFO last year. Behind precise and technically elaborate painting stands a vision full of paradoxes: the vanity of recognized human values ​​with the simultaneous affirmation of existence despite its absurdity and loneliness in the technical world. The artist deliberately uses references to kitsch, pop-culture bizarre as well as irony and grotesque, allowing to endure social hell and survive in the senseless violence of the universe.

In his works, Przemek Pyszczek explores the aesthetic landscape of post-transformation Poland. His radiant, geometric compositions question the unbreakable links between form and content. By transferring the aesthetics typical of socialist realist architecture into a painting medium, Pyszczek emphasizes what is personal in form. The visual landscape of the state after transformation in his art becomes a landscape of memory, overwritten by the constructed memories of childhood. 

At the invitation of the Society of Friends of the National Museum in Warsaw, we took part in a guided tour of the exhibition.

Monuments create a landscape of our values, which is why they are often subject to disputes. They commemorate statesmen, heroes and victims of wars, represent common ideals, “populate” cities, and dominate the landscape. Along with changes in borders and political orders, the monuments of the bygone era are being destroyed, transformed and renamed. Exhibition at the Museum of Sculpture Xawery Dunikowski at Królikarnia describes the functions, fates and processes that monuments are subject to.

Ellen von Unwerth is one of the best fashion photographers. She is known for provocative and funny shots of models, music stars and movie icons. She had many individual exhibitions and her works were shown at photography exhibitions. 

Hanna Zawa- Cywińska was born in 1939. She’s a painter. She also makes sculptures and graphics. She studied advertising and graphics at State University of New York.  In 1981 she graduated from this University.

She participated in over 150 exhibitions all over the world. Exactly 20 years ago, in 1999, her large individual exhibition took place in Zachęta

The show presents an overview of the work of Daniel Rycharski, an artist who cooperates with diverse groups, such as agricultural and religious associations, a social club of rural housewives, and LGBT+ activists, wrestling with numerous social fears and prejudices. The pieces displayed tell the story of the seemingly contradictory experience of being an artist who believes in God and is gay at the same time. Working in a conservative rural community, Rycharski tries to come up with new ways of emancipation, as well as posing questions with regard to belonging to a religious community and its boundaries. Rycharski’s radical approach to faith, which has no counterpart in Polish art, is the driving force for his artistic practice. The artist, rooted in religion both institutionally and via his family, proposes his own new set of principles for practising religion, which would include those that were previously excluded from the religious community: “Christianity without religion”, as he calls it.

25- 27th January 2019 a trip to Berlin had place.

We saw exhibitions of Katarzyna Kozyra, Agnieszka Polska and private collections.

The exhibition covers the period from the First World War up to the early 1980s. This lets it show how the transformation of the avant-garde movements in Poland – from the Expressionism and Formism of the second decade of the 20th century to the Neo-Avant-garde and “post-propaganda” of the 1970’s and 80’s – overlapped with the existence of two states of different territorial ranges, different regimes, and different ethnic composition. We also see how these changes affected the limits of the impact of the Polish Avant-garde, which did not correspond to the country’s borders.

The Great War exhibition addresses the relationship between modern art and the experience of war shown from different perspectives, while highlighting the differences between the memory of this event in the art of Western Europe and Central and Eastern Europe.

The exhibition Highly Unlikely but not Impossible showcases the works of Hiwa K – an Iraqi Kurd who found political asylum in Europe almost 20 years ago, and today is considered one of the leading contemporary artists in the world. His unique artistic tactics are based on creating the form using of the practices of everyday life, childhood memories, upbringing and family anecdotes. His oeuvre — a combination of autobiographical elements with things he overhears and fictional stories — sheds a new light on matters such as refugees, functioning in another culture, as well as the geopolitical conditions of human existence.

The circle presents a collection of over one hundred photographic objects made jointly by Hanna Rechowicz and Jan Smaga. She recalls the history of the house at ul. Lekarska in Warsaw, where the artist still lives today.

Finissage of Hawrot, Krajewska and Waliszewska exhibitions is the culmination of the artist’s artistic cooperation. 

The exhibitions presents hand sewn and embroidered kimono furisode and belt obi fukuro- objects with image motifs Idol Aleksandry Waliszewskiej and pigmented prints of the painter. 

Maps under the sky of Rio de Janeiro is a presentation of the artistic output of Anna Bella Geiger (b. 1933), a pioneer of Brazilian art. In the historical context of modern art in Brazil, Geiger, alongside Hélio Oticica, Lygia Clark, and Lygia Pape, is one of Rio de Janeiro’s top artists who have re-established the connection between the expressionist tradition with neo-concretism (neoconcretismo). The exhibition reflects the diversity of the artist’s interests: from anthropology to astronomy, from indigenous cultures and alchemy to concrete poetry and Brazilian music, from modern utopias and dystopias to game theory. Geiger’s works from the 1970s – drawings, prints, and video projections – serve as the exhibition’s starting point and form its core. Displayed next to them is a selection of objects from the Drawers (Gavetas), Scrolls (Rollos), and Little Scrolls (Rollinhos) series created in the 1990s. In these works, the artist treated maps as expressive “containers” which are likened, as in the case of the Drawers, to magic ready-mades. In turn, cartography is presented as a “secret” (drawer) and “soluble” phenomenon, rather than an expression of transparent, verified knowledge.

Xawery Wolski was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1960.
Studied fine art in Warsaw, in the Academie des Beaux Arts in Paris ( studio Cesar ) and in the New York Studio School of drawing, painting and sculpture .His first independent work was created in 1983 in Carrara, Italy where he explored the local materials and established his artistic language based on reflection upon time and space with an aesthetic of minimalism. His work is executed in natural materials such as earth, fired clay, stone . ” I am interested in creating bridges of communication permitting past and present appear in unity and with hope that the dialogue in time and space continues in order for new configurations to be found

He continued his post grade studies in Paris. His interest for terra cotta and it’s multiple anthropological meanings lead him to Peru and a year later to Mexico where he received grants from the French Ministry of Culture and Foreign Affairs to pursue his investigation on ancient materials and ways of expression with the purpose of creating contemporary artwork.

He establishes his studio in 1997 in Mexico City in order to create several site specific sculptures, and where he is working until now sharing time with his native country Poland. “Infinity Chains “, his major work started in 1988 is an ongoing project of site specific sculptures in form of gigantic chains executed in various materials such as clay, earth, bronze which symbolize his interest for unity.

One of the most internationally recognized Polish artists, Joanna Piotrowska, has decided to donate 100 photographs to the cause of fighting violence against women. Together with the artist, we decided to support the Feminoteka Foundation, which has been working for over 15 years against gender discrimination and violence against women. In just one day we managed to collect over 50 thousand zlotys from Polish and foreign donors! The first 100 people received a copy of the artist’s limited edition photograph.

Thanks to the donations received from our patrons, we continue to support the development of the Zachęta colletion. We received a donation to purchase Olga Wolniak’s Marek and Tomek (the portrait of Marek Sobczyk and Tomasz Piłat). We wish to thank our donors and all members of Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts.

With the support of the Society, the participants of Sharon Lockhart’s project Little Review, students from the Youth Sociotherapy Centre in Rudzienko went Venice to see the exhibition at the Polish Pavilion and meet the artist.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Art Alphabet. How to Read Contemporary Art is a professional training for teachers who specialize in art, art history, cultural education, history and Polish language. Each training consists of 4 study visits that take place in Zachęta. The study is available only to teachers from outside Warsaw, preferably from small cities with a limited access to museums and galleries. Thanks to our sponsor the participation in the training is free for participants.

During the study visits teachers participate in lectures and workshops with art educators, curators and artists. They also have the opportunity to share their own experience.

Zachęta – National Gallery of Art shares its resources on the Creative Commons licences. The Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts would like to contribute to this project by helping Zachęta in building the second step – a digital educational tool based on the collection of the gallery, but offering an educational insight to the artworks, helping to discover contexts and shape abilities necessary to critical reception of art.

The project is in line with the trends diagnosed in the NMC Horizon Report: 2013 Museum Edition that underlines the importance of digital educational tools, based on digital collections.

This resource is created mainly for students and teachers, but we hope it will also meet the needs of art lovers who would like to learn something new on their own. It is an invitation to start a journey through contemporary art and experience it fully regardless of one’s age and competences.

The launch of the project is scheduled for 2017.