Thursday, 17th June, at 07:30 p.m. will take place at ANAID ART GALLERY the opening of the exhibition "It isn't important, it's only art", curator Monika Szewczyk (Arsenał Gallery from Białystok). The exhibition is organized by thePolish Cultural Institute from Bucharest and the Arsenal Gallery from Białystok, Poland. The works of art came from the colection of the Arsenał Gallery, Białystok.
Artists exhibit: Laura Pawela, Julita Wójcik, Oskar Dawicki, Anna Molska, Radosław Szlaga, Izabela Gustowska, Magisters, Joanna Rajkowska, Rafał Bujnowski, Zbigniew Libera, Sędzia Główny, Małgorzata Jabłońska, Azorro, Agnieszka Polska, Zuzanna Janin, Paweł Susid, Vesna Bukovec, etc.
The audience interested in contemporary art will be able to visit the exhibition from 17th June 2010 - 9th July 2010.
The contemporary art is often seen as an expression form being extremely abstract or being much more subordinated to the daily politic, to a social urgency, other way said, the art is capture of the moment and much more subjective, being in this way mist by the power that can sensibilities the audience that to be not too elitist. An audience that is seems to be formed exclusively by critics, press people, gallerists, collectioners and even artists. This "narrowing" of the contemporary artistic discourse results into a banishment of the art from the general interest, mediatic and institutional, convicts it to a secondary role and puts it into question the usefulness of it.
The exhibition "It isn't important, it's only art" is a way to raise the hand. It is an exhibition about the way in which the contemporary art reacts at the press indifference, to the lose of their authority in the audience, to the problem that it is putted harder in these days: has arts today a use? Is it necessary? And, if yes, how? Questions that are directly assumed attacked frontal and by that the answer is into a rough and honest manner.
Monika Szewczyk is art critic, curator and manager of the Arsenał Gallery from Białystok, from where came the art works that it will be presented in the exhibition.
"Are we surprised by the statement expressed in the title? If not, why aren't we? Have we gotten used to the unreliability of the media which evaluate cultural events according to their effectiveness on the one hand and their accessibility on the other? Have we become reconciled to the hostile attitude of clerks who treat art as a costly whim and who create hierarchies of cultural institution, with galleries invariably at the far end as the least useful and the most bothersome? Do we treat as natural not only the destitution but also the indolence and a lack of professional attitude on the part of cultural institutions? If so, we live in a post-communist country, possibly in Poland. Art life in Poland after 2000, although very vibrant, has not attracted much social interest, which is however steadily rising. Art, who displays a high quality level and is ubiquitous in Polish reality, is suffering from an absence of dialogue with intellectuals. While it has all the makings of being an important driver of social processes, it is alienated. This state of affairs in Polish art has led to the creation of a great many tautological works, to an enhanced reflection on the status of art and art criticism, on the role and position of the artist, on the mission of cultural institutions, on threats in the art marker. For the first time ever artists have taken up, or rather initiated a discourse which has so far been evidently ailing or nonexistent.
The works on display make us aware of how far we departed from the Romantic paradigm of the author and work so much cherished by Polish audiences. The legacy of this paradigm seems a source of misunderstandings and difficulties in addressing contemporary art. We need to take a lot of effort, indeed, so that art might become meaningful not only for us."
Curator: Monika Szewczyk
Curator: Monika Szewczyk