At the end of this months, renowned artists will expose their work to the critical gaze of tourists and residents of Lublin. Their art will be meant both as a reflection on today's issues of urbanism, as well a new page in the history of the city.
Lublin Open City Festival 2013 is one of the important contemporary art exhibitions - not to mention the largest exhibition of its kind - in eastern Poland. The idea of the festival is to release works of art from the sterile void of a museum, into the changing environment of a city.
“Open City” refers to the idea of Open Form of the renowned architect Oskar Hansen, according to which art and urban projects act as active backgrounds for human existence, in order to create events that influence awareness and ethics. During the festival's first edition, in 2009, curator Waldemar Tatarczuk referred to the phenomenon of "open city" meaning an undefended city in times of war – which an attacker could easily take, yet not bomb. This idea was to prevent harm to the city and to its civilians. Thus, “open city” is a metaphor indicating the moment when a city stops functioning normally, yet art manages to maintain peace.
Anda Rottenberg, former director of the Zącheta Gallery in Warsaw and the curator of the festival's 2013 edition, says,
The fifth edition of the festival will therefore refer to Lublin as a city on the border of cultures and religions in both historical and contemporary contexts. The starting point will be its symbolic role in the formation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth - which was created with Union of Lublin in 1569 - and the various implications of this event for Lublin in later historical periods.
This year's festival participants include artists Colin Ardley, Mirosław Bałka, Pavel Buchler, Esra Ersen, Assaf Gruber, Jan Gryka, Flo Kasearu, Yakov Kazhdan, Zlatko Kopljar, Olaf Metzel, Anna Molska, Marina Naprushkina, Egle Rakauskaite, Pedro Cabrita Reis, Mykola Ridnyi, Slavs and Tatars and Leon Tarasewicz.
For more information visit: www.opencity.pl
Source: press releases, edited by jn, 11/06/2013
Translation: LB 11/06/2013