Piotr Uklański, "The Nazis", 2000 and Dance Floor 1996, installations view, Courtesy of the Zacheta National Gallery of Art
The exhibition Black Milk - Holocaust in Contemporary Art features the work of 13 artists from 7 countries. Poland will be represented by Mirosław Balka, Zbigniew Libera, Piotr Uklański and Artur Żmijewski. All artists participating in the display respond to the Holocaust in different ways from their own cultural and personal perspective. Together, the works raise the question of how the Holocaust could or should be dealt with artistically today.
The aim of the project is to examine different artistic attitudes towards the Holocaust, as well as to invoke a wider debate about the role of art and artist as observer and commentator on historical events. The display is also an opportunity to present the works of Polish artists to the Danish public.
The exhibition is the first of its kind in Denmark. It received the support of, among others, the Polish Embassy in Copenhagen.
The exhibition’s title Black Milk comes from the poem Death Fugue from 1945, which describes the Romanian author Paul Celan’s own concentration camp experiences. The unexpected coalition of black and milk also reflects the exhibition’s contrasting works and the surprising ways in which the artists work with the Holocaust theme. The artists deal with themes such as victim versus torturer, enemy images, demagogy, collective memory and the after life in an inventive, and at times, untamed manner. They use well-known symbols and historical references, which are contextualized in novel ways, reflecting a contemporary perspective on Holocaust. – says the official exhibition side
Black Milk – Holocaust is on display until 27th April, 2014 at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Stændertorvet 3A, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark
For further information, visit the official exhibition website.
Source: samtidskunst.dk, ed. and translated: Katarzyna Maksimiuk, 14.02.2014