Jakub Stępień aka Hakobo, "FAB", detail from "Łódź Fabryczna" neon, photo: press materials
"Łódź City" is the latest instalment in Kordegarda Project's "Room with a View" series of cities seen through the eyes of local artists, musicians and designers
The exhibition owes its title to Jakub Stępień, aka Hakobo. In addition, Hakobo designed the visuals for the show's invitation and the accompanying materials. The invitation is illustrated with a photograph showing a cropped image of the (broken?) neon sign of the local train station: "ŁÓDŹ FAB[RYCZNA]". When describing the picture, Hakobo used the dictionary definition of the informal British English adjective "fab": "fab = the Fab Four = The Beatles" and a Polish translation of the adjective "fabulous," which means "legendary," and in vernacular: "fantastic, exciting."
It is this kind of "fabulous" Łódź that the exhibition is about, with its history, still visible in the urban make-up, its social issues, continuing modernization and commercialisation of the public space, the unique
Art Museum and its avant-garde tradition and history of important projects organised by artists for artists, the world-renowned
Łódź Film School, the
Academy of Fine Arts and its graduates: visual artists and fashion designers. Finally, its vibrant music scene.
For the show, Jakub "Hakobo" Stępień, graphic and industrial designer and an expert on the city, has selected works related to Łódź from his vast collection of graphics. We can see drawings of buildings, a fake football fan's scarf with Łódź written in the languages of the four cultures that had originally created the city, as well as a map showing its tourist attractions, both typical and less obvious (created in association with the Bęc Zmiana Foundation).
When approaching the gallery, the viewer sees pictograms of different hand gestures in its windows. If he does not know sign language, he may feel intrigued by the cryptic message and, hopefully, eager to enter the gallery to solve the riddle - the letters form the word Łódź. Tomasz Matuszak is the author of the project. A similar work was presented by him for the first time in the Israeli-Palestinian border zone in Haifa at the turn of 2000 and 2001 as a mediation effort of sorts, entitled Matrimony. In 2004, he showed another version of the work in the windows of Café Europa in Łódź, a soc-modernist pavilion proudly aspiring to Europeanism. In Warsaw this summer, the exhibition presents the third version of the project - this time designed as a pseudo-commercial teaser of the city and the exhibition.
An ugly, yet romantic, fantastic Łódź is depicted in the City Slideshow made by Monika Masłoń in 2006. Andrzej Chrzanowski presents works which show the city in a state of flux, undergoing chaotic revitalisation, while aspiring to fulfil the role of a modern metropolis. A work by Monika Błażusiak, visual artist and talented fashion designer, depicts the present-day "restored" Łódź. The author created a constructivist/abstract portrait of Manufaktura, the huge shopping mall converted from former a factory, which currently serves as the local centre of commercial and social life. Błażusiak also shows some intriguing textiles with "views of Łódź," an allusion to the city's textile-industry traditions.
Kamil Kuskowski's mural "Anti-Semitism Repressed" explores an inconvenient history. His work was created using a quite special kind of found object: anti-Semitic graffiti found on the walls in different Polish cities. In Łódź such graffiti remain a common feature in the verbal war between the fans of Widzew and ŁKS, the city's two leading football clubs. Although they are painted over, the inscriptions still show through.
Wunderteam.pl's designers, Paulina Stępień and Magdalena Koziej present their own interior design project for the café (ms Café) inside the Museum of Art, as well as other works related to the city. Modapolka.pl, a clothing brand designed by Paulina Stępień aimed at young female urbanites in the city, will also show several pieces at Kordegarda.
Gregor Gonsior links fashion design with street art and mural painting. Examples of the many artistic forms used by him are featured in Łódź City. For the duration of the show, one of the gallery's spaces has been turned into a screening room for contemporary short films made by students set in Łódź and prepared in association with the Łódź Film School. The city's visual portrait is accompanied by music projects: Łódź-set music videos by Balbina Bruszewska, including one for "Who If Not You" by the hip hop artist O.S.T.R. You can also see The City Flows, a full-feature animated film from which the video material was sampled.
Curator: Magda Kardasz
Artists invited to participate in the exhibition: Sławomir Belina, Monika Błażusiak, Balbina Bruszewska, Agnieszka Chojnacka, Artur Chrzanowski, Gregor Gonsior, Kamil Kuskowski, Monika Masłoń, Tomasz Matuszak, Modapolka.pl, Anna Orlikowska, Krzysztof Ostrowski, Jakub Stępień - Hakobo, Wunderteam.pl, and students from the
Łódź Film School.
The exhibition runs July 30 - October 3, 2010.
Kordegarda Project
ul. Gałczyńskiego 3
00-362 Warsaw
phone: (+48 22) 826 01 36
*Source: press materials