Zachęta – National Gallery of Art

artist: Paulina Ołowska
curator: Magda Kardasz
collaboration: Katarzyna Kołodziej

The largest Polish presentation of Paulina Ołowska’s work to date, the exhibition shows both its thematic diversity and the various working methods employed by the artist. It features works of painting, sculpture, stage design, installation, neon light, assemblage, drawing, collage, textile, as well as a new installation, created specially for the exhibition: a fashion store with a collection by the brand Clemens en August.

In her practice, Ołowska explores the issue of liaisons between the historical avant-garde and the present, creating a melange of arts: high-brow with applied and popular. She is preoccupied with contemporariness and topicality, which she confronts with utopian visions from the past, encouraging the viewer to reflect on forgotten aesthetics and ideologies.

The exhibition takes its title from the name of a perfumery shop which functioned at the corner of Krucza and Żurawia Streets in Warsaw from the 1960s. It bore a stylish neon sign with the inscription and an image of bottle of perfume. In the 1980s, the sign was removed, and in the 1990s it was replaced by a ‘billboard girl’ typical for the era’s advertising. Today the windows of the now-defunct shop are covered with layers of street posters. The spell of Warsaw is gone.

Paulina Ołowska studies the processes of urban transformation and social relationships in an era of growing consumerism. Her works often feature the female figure, narrating about the woman in liberal capitalism and as an object of consumption and advertising.

The exhibition features works dating back to 2004. The artist focuses on works relating to her earlier projects and realisations, broadly inspired by Warsaw – her history and transformation. Warsaw, according to Ołowska, is a woman. “The Spell of Warsaw” speaks of dreams, of perfect life, referring with a sense of distance to changes and new situations.