Imagine a Breath of Fresh Air

Imagine a Breath of Fresh Air

Artists: BCAA System, Gabriela BK, Mark Fridvalszki, Seana Gavin, Eva Jaroňová, Nam June Paik, Kinga Kiełczyńska, Diana Lelonek, Ruth Wolf Rehfeldt, Milan Ressel, Leon Romanow, Adéla Součková, Maja Smrekar, Superflux, Suzanne Treister, Ondřej Trhoň

Curators: Jindřich Chalupecký Society curatorial collective (Barbora Ciprová, Veronika Čechová, Tereza Jindrová, Karina Kottová) and Paulina Olszewska

Galeria Studio
Plac Defilad 1 PKiN
Warsaw

5.06–30.07. 2023

Photo: Anna Zagrodzka

“Floral patterns on the facades reflect the sun, to which the real flowers growing in vertical gardens also turn. On the rooftops, hyper-modern solar power plants produce clean energy for a city where people and nature live in harmony. Vines are winding around and moss grows untamed.” In their article for cultural magazine A2, Jakub Krahulec and Ondřej Trhoň depict a vision of solar punk—“a genre on the boundary between wild online daydreaming and sci-fi. At a time when we have barely started to recover from the effects of a global pandemic, and the devastating Russian war in Ukraine almost reaches the border with Poland (and with many other no less serious conflicts worldwide), this may sound like a rather ridiculous fairytale. While we face many humanitarian crises, uncontrolled inflation, an energy crisis and a looming food crisis, climate disruption is taking its toll in the background. Its consequences are already apparent on many levels, and yet we do not fully admit to this reality.
Therefore, it is not surprising that our current outlook is very distant from the utopian visions of the past: those full of unbound love, harmony with nature and reciprocity between humans and other species, not to mention the well-known socialist visions of “commanding the wind and the rain,” going to space and controlling not only weather conditions but also other planetary processes, all in the name of techno-optimism. Rather than the courage to embark on unrestrained utopian plans, today’s visions of our future are accompanied by anxiety and black scenarios. There will inevitably be a future, even if it is one after the extinction of our species. But perhaps there are more promising prospects after all.

The upcoming group exhibition at Galeria Studio in Warsaw elaborates on the theme of visions of the future on several levels. It involves projects by a number of Czech, Polish and international artists. The exhibition encompasses two main levels, which will at the same time reflect the spatial layout of Galeria Studio, divided into two floors, one above the other. One part will deal with the concept of returning to tradition and (our) nature, while the other part will focus on techno-optimistic or dystopian ideas of the future, which might be associated with science-fiction.
One part of the exhibition will critically examine the aforementioned solar punk visions and ideas about the future, linking green living with state-of-the-art technology, science and “progress,” as well as various strategies for survival in a dystopian, even post-human world. The other part will explore various strategies of degrowth, deceleration or sustainable living in harmony with nature.

The exhibition’s narrative will travel through time, but also beyond real time, to explore past and future utopias. The theme of escapism will permeate the exhibition, set in separated geographical locations, dream realms, fictional scenarios and old utopian ideas. But its purpose is not to escape into the unreal. On the contrary, we hope that by combining a number of various artworks and projects, hints of possibility will begin to emerge, from which a way out of today’s situation, that is oppressive on many levels, can slowly be carved. When it seems there is nowhere to run, we can try running into the future – and from there, start to reshape the present.

Aside from contemporary artworks, the exhibition will also feature several historical works from the Galeria Studio Collection, Miejska Galeria bwa in Bydgoszcz, the Aleš South Bohemian Gallery, and private collections.

The exhibition is the fourth part of the series Islands: Possibilities of Togetherness presented by the Jindřich Chalupecký Society, and curated by the JCHS collective and Paulina Olszewska, curator at Galeria Studio.

The exhibition is part of the international project Islands of Kinship: A Collective Manual for Sustainable and Inclusive Art Institutions, co-funded by the European Union and Czech Ministry of Culture.

Exhibition partner & co-producer:  Jindřich Chalupecký Society

Exhibition partners: Czech Center in Warsaw, Liszt Institute – Hungarian Cultural Center Warsaw

Exhibition brochure available here

Scroll back to top