Rebellion of the Deaf. Spectacle

Rebellion of the Deaf is a performance and film by one of the most interesting visual artists of the middle generation, an associate professor at the Chair of Intermedia of the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk. The eponymous Rebellion of the Deaf refers to the protest of deaf students from the American Gallaudet University, who in 1988 fought for the appointment of the first deaf rector in history. The project was inspired by the story of a Dutch artist, a daughter of Chinese immigrants, born in Europe. When she was born, social services advised her parents to raise her without using their own language, in order to better assimilate her. The parents, who did not know Dutch, brought up their daughter practically without speaking to her: they used only about 50 of the simplest words at home.

Zachęta – National Gallery of Art

Very Diverse and Very Exquisite

Graphics from the collection of Zachęta

Graphics are the most numerous and at the same time the least known works in the Zachęta collection. The individual objects included in the exhibitions have never allowed the broader audiences to look at the whole of the collection in a broader way. Therefore, we wanted to recall a genre that occupied such an important place on the artistic scene a few decades ago, and over the last 30 years has been gradually marginalised. The 2,100 works in our collection are a very diverse set in terms of style, quality and form; with particularly outstanding works from the 1960s. We noticed their consistency, high artistic level, as well as combination of traditional techniques with the search for new formal solutions, so characteristic of graphic arts.

Zachęta – National Gallery of Art

Bogna Burska

Rebellion of the Deaf

Rebellion of the Deaf is a performance and film by one of the most interesting visual artists of the middle generation, an associate professor at the Chair of Intermedia of the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk. The eponymous Rebellion of the Deaf refers to the protest of deaf students from the American Gallaudet University, who in 1988 fought for the appointment of the first deaf rector in history. The project was inspired by the story of a Dutch artist, a daughter of Chinese immigrants, born in Europe. When she was born, social services advised her parents to raise her without using their own language, in order to better assimilate her. The parents, who did not know Dutch, brought up their daughter practically without speaking to her: they used only about 50 of the simplest words at home.

Zachęta – National Gallery of Art

Beyond Cybis

This cross-sectional exhibition of Polish 20th and 21st century painting includes a wide range of works by outstanding Polish artists of different generations — representatives of the key currents of art history and contemporary artistic trends. The exhibition features, among others, contemporary classics, artists representing conceptual attitudes, educators and experimenters, as well as artistic personalities that are worth reminding to the broader audience, who are now relegated to the sidelines of art history.

Zachęta – National Gallery of Art

Larisa Crunțeanu

Aria Mineralia

Larisa Crunțeanu’s project is connected with an accidental finding in the centre of Bucharest. Together with the artist Sonia Hornung, they encountered an object that was difficult to identify — a silent, stone-shaped loudspeaker standing on a lawn. The paradoxical finding provokes many questions, not only about what the object is and what it is for, but also about what it sounds like and what its voice says. Is it one of the voices of a larger group? Where is the boundary between its reality and being artificial?

Zachęta Project Room