Aneta Szylak (Director of Wyspa Institute of Art, Gdańsk, Poland) will present on the developments of the independent art scene in Poland, as well as on her own practice, as part of The Curator’s Perspective—ICI’s itinerant public discussion series featuring international curators who give New York audiences new insights on contemporary art practices around the world by sharing their research, interests, and curatorial projects. This is a rare opportunity to hear from Szylak about the history of the independent art scene in Gdańsk, a city that fostered the very notion of independence in Poland as the birthplace of the Solidarity movement that was instrumental in ending the country’s Communist rule.
Szylak will present the Wyspa Institute of Art, located in the Gdańsk Shipyard; the programs she has developed there, including the international visual arts festival, Alternativa; and how the notions of labor, leisure, materiality, palimpsest, and polyphony that stem from everyday life in the Baltic port have entered and shaped her own practice as a curator. In this context, many of the artistic and curatorial projects presented by Szylak engage directly with their immediate surroundings, and appear to have trespassed the limits that separate artistic and curatorial gestures.
This event is organized in collaboration with The Graduate Center, CUNY. This event is free and open to the public. To attend please RSVP to rsvp@curatorsintl.org with ANETA SZYLAK in the subject line. The talk will be preceded by a reception at The James Gallery at CUNY, 5–7pm.
As part of International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP)'s exhibition program, Aneta Szylak has curated The Field is to the Sky, Only Backwards (September 4–October 18, 2013). ISCP is holding an exhibition reception on Wednesday, September 4 at 7–9pm at 1040 Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11211.