Materia(l)nie. Alicja Bielawska Barbara Falender
Artists: Alicja Bielawska & Barbara Falender
7.02-17.04.2022
Galeria Studio
Plac Defilad 1, PKiN
Warsaw
Photo: Anna Zagrodzka
The starting point for the exhibition MATERIA(L)NIE [(IM)MATERIAL] is Barbara Falender’s 1973 sculpture series Erotic Pillows from the Galeria Studio Collection. The sculptures, made from Carrara marble, entered the collection in 1985. Two years later they were shown at Galeria Studio, causing a stir due to their bold erotic overtones. Paulina Olszewska, curator of the current exhibition, has invited artist Alicja Bielawska to enter into a dialogue with Falender’s sculptures. Bielawska will prepare a textile installation that will engage with the space of Galeria Studio, creating an intimate atmosphere for the presentation of the sculptures. For the first time, drawings on paper for Erotic Pillows, also from 1973, will be presented at the exhibition. Working with materials and their properties has been crucial for both Falender’s and Bielawska’s art. In transforming the physical, the actual, the artists move into the sphere of the sensual and impressionistic. The tension between the two qualities, materiality and sensuality, is the main axis of the exhibition. The exhibition will present one of the most important aspects of Erotic Pillows—female pleasure and delight derived from sexuality.
Barbara Falender (b. 1947) studied in the Faculty of Sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw under Prof. Jerzy Jarnuszkiewicz. She creates sculpture, drawings and photography, works in stone, bronze, epoxy, porcelain and glass, combining various materials in her works. She was recipient of an Italian Government scholarship from Laboratorio dei marmi Carlo Nicoli in Carrara, and one from the Tadeusz Kościuszko Foundation in New York (1998). Her works have been presented in numerous solo exhibitions, including Opera Gallery in Warsaw (2020), the Centre for Polish Sculpture in Oronsko (2007), Kordegarda Gallery, Warsaw, (1995), and Athenaeum Gallery in Copenhagen (1975).
Alicja Bielawska (b. 1980), graduated from Art History at the University of Warsaw (2005), and Fine Arts at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam (2009). She is a PhD student in Interdepartmental Environmental Doctoral Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdansk. She creates drawings and sculptures using fabric, metal, wood and ceramics. In her work, the artist focuses on the material sphere of everyday life and relationships between objects, interiors and memory. She touches upon the issue of relativity in our perception. She also introduces elements of choreography and performance into her work.
Exhibition Partner: DEKOMA
Exhibition brochure available here.