The artists behind szu szu are Piotr Kopik, Ivo Nikić and Karol Radziszewski - who decided to take matters in their own hands while still students at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. They founded an informal group specializing in artists’ exhibitions in locations unaffiliated with the art sphere. 'We were students of painting in Jarosław Modzelewski’s studio', Piotr Kopik says in an interview in the book, 'but […] we would film videos outside the studio. Besides, we simply wanted to do projects that would not only be seen by people from the Academy. At the beginning, it was students from the University of Warsaw, but eventually we became interested in reaching the outside world'.
The three artists launched a mobile platform for art initiatives in 2001. To date they have organized over 40 exhibitions, installations and actions in Europe and Asia. In recent years, the trio has also been performing as Kashanti - an experimental shanty band. In the same interview, Karol Radziszewski explains that:
from the very beginning we functioned as curators of the flying gallery without a fixed venue, but which existed in a form of an idea. And its goal was to present the works of other artists, hence the name 'gallery'. That’s because the name 'group' suggests a similar aesthetic. And with our project it was always different as there never was any aesthetic in common…
Their main area of interest is the city, which they use as a stage for DIY projects, for which they invite both professionals and amateurs as collaborators.
Kaja Pawełek writes in New Phenomena in Polish Art after 2000 (CCA Ujazdowski Castle):
Their strategies of action resist clearly defined associations or definitions – a characteristic which is also one of the fundamental stipulations of the collective. At the same time, szu szu constitutes a rare example of an artist-run space within the recent Polish art scene.
One of the first initiatives by szu szu was W centrumie / In the Center (2001), an open-air drawing session organized in cooperation with a group of friends, that was taking place at the back of Warsaw’s central shopping mall. The outcomes of this action were later exhibited at the University of Warsaw Library – a space that combines industrial architecture with corporate decor. Their subsequent projects include Idziesz przez miasto / As You Go Through the City (2002), a video and installation exhibition presented in the corridors of an exclusive office building and mall, and Sex, Kebab & Computer (2005), a happening produced in collaboration with the French group Seriall, taking place in a city quarter bursting with sex shops and kebab booths. That event was pointing to the fascination with the exoticized city scape – full of kitch, chaos and faults, and thus enrichening and intensifying the experience of the space.
The new monograph, published by the Pole Widzenia Foundation, comprises an extensive archive-diary of szu szu actions, a conversation between Grzegorz Borkowski and the members, and a lexicon of entries related to the group’s history. The latter section was edited by curators and critics Kaja Pawełek, Konrad Schiller, Stach Szabłowski, Kuba Szreder and Katarzyna Szydłowska. graphic design was conceived by Noviki Studio Grafiki.
The publication has been financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.
Official website of szu szu: http://szuszu.pl/
szu szu
Piotr Kopik, Ivo Nikić, Karol Radziszewski
Editor: Kaja Pawełek
Graphic design: Noviki Studio Grafiki
Publisher: Fundacja Pole Widzenia
ISBN 978-83-930878-9-1
Sources: szu szu, New Phenomena in Polish Art After 2000, own materials, ed. Agnieszka Sural, 2.10.2013 translated with edits by Ania Micińska 7.10.2013