Prague Quadrennial Gold Medal for Poland

ekspozycja-narodowa-pq-fot-mat-promo.jpg, small, 13th Prague Quadrennial Performance Design and Space, photo. press release, Prague Quadrennial Gold Medal for Poland

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The Polish national exhibition Post-Apocalypsis has been awarded the Gold Medal of the 13th Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space festival.

The awards ceremony was held in the the Prague Archa Theatre on 22 June, 2015. The Post-Apocalypsis exhibition was awarded PQ 2015's Gold Medal in the Sound Design category. This is the first medal for a Polish exhibition in 36 years. The Poland exhibition in the student section was also selected as among the best works.

The curator of the Polish national exhibition is Agnieszka Jelewska. It was created by a team of artists and experts: Michał Cichy, Paweł Janicki, Michał Krawczak, and Rafał Zapała. Architect and scenographer Jerzy Gurawski also took part in the project.

Zdjęcie z Ekspozycji Narodowej podczas 13. Praskiego Quadriennale, fot. materiały prasowe — 13th Prague Quadrennial Performance Design and Space, photo. press release

Post-Apocalypsis is both PQ and Poland’s first exposition to incorporate the creative work of researchers, programmers, composers, designers and architects to such a great extent. "It is interdisciplinary teamwork," says Jelewska.

The Polish project is highly interactive – it engages viewers and introduces them to an installation that merges sound, weather, and politics (the main topics of this year’s PQ) into a unique eco-system. Visitors are surrounded by an audiosphere composed of current weather reports from selected places in the world. The installation features trees that, when touched, quote Polish Romanticism classics. Jerzy Grotowski’s Apocalypsis cum figuris, one of the 20^th century's most important theatrical performances, was the direct inspiration behind this project.

Poland at the 13th Prague Quadrennial

Before Post-Apocalypsis' success, works by Polish artists had been awarded gold at the Prague Quadrennial only three times. In 1967, the award was given to Andrzej Kreutz Majewski, 4 years later Jerzy Gurawski, Józef Szajna, Leokadia Serafinowicz and Zofia Wierchowicz. The last Polish representatives to be presented with the Gold Medal were Jan Berdyszak, Adam Kilian, Kazimierz Mikulski, Zofia Pietrusińska, Leokadia Serafinowicz, Zygmunt Smandzik, Zofia Stanisławska-Howrukowa and Jerzy Zitzman in 1979.

The main award, the Golden Triga for best exhibition of this year’s PQ, was given to Estonia, which defeated the Latvian and Finnish representatives in the final. The Polish exhibition in the student section, by Małgorzata Wdowik, Tamara Antonijevic and Robert Läßig, was shortlisted, along with the Czech and Latvian teams, for the top three most-promising talents of the quadrennial.

The Polish PQ 2015 exhibitions were coordinated by the Theatre Institute in Warsaw and organized by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. This year’s edition of the Prague Quadrennial exhibits works from 78 different countries, which makes it the world’s biggest event of visual and performative art.

Source: press release, edit. AW

Translated by Paweł Trzaskowski, 24 June 2015

Language English

13th Prague Quadrennial Performance Design and Space