Hannah Arendt and boredom

On tuesday and wednesday I was again, working at the Hannah Arendt exhibition. Not to get bored I was reading a book, smoking cigarettes (one artwork called "Smoking" is a room where people are supposed to smoke, like good old Hannah did) and also making my contributions to the exhibition. In one of the rooms the organisers made a working room where everybody can write or draw something about the exhibition, life or philosophy of Arendt. So out of my boredom I also did some drawings... the visitors wouldn't know it was one of the crew anyway... besides, I love to draw. There they are....






Apart from that, of course I have made a photo of what is from the organisators forbidden - the view from the window of Jüdische Mädchenschule. I think it is a strange idea to forbid to take photos of the surroundings, but well... so there it is!

What happened last Saturday

Well, last saturday I started my new little job... as a guard (in german: Aufsichtskraft!) at the "Hannah Arendt Denkraum" exhibition. I have to say that it is my second job like that, and to be honest it is the second "whatever job" in my whole life. Maybe that sounds strange, but I have never "jobbed". It is not so commom in Poland to have such little jobs, people usually finish their studies and get a real job with real money. This here, is not a job I do for money, really, it is too little. Can you imagine to earn 6,5 EUR an hour? But on the other hand, at least I know I will have 6 hours a week just to sit there and READ books! I don't really have time just to read. When I sit in ZERO I always have something to do, so I will enjoy my "time-out-of-real-work" at the Hannah Arendt thing. On saturday there was an opening, there were many people, many "Mitte-people", the ones you don't really meet in Kreuzberg, it was funny. The exhibition itself is ok, it is not great art, but it is a tribute to Arendt, more philosophy and theory ("Inhalt" - that is a cool german word for what I mean).

Friday the 13th

Last night we wanted to go to see the diploma presentation of Alex Augsten, who designed and built a cool system of furniture for temporary used spaces. We have actually used his furniture on the Kunstsalon, it worked great! But last evening as we were standing an the SBahn station, I realised I forgot the address of the place where the presentation was supposed to take place. So we didn't manage to get there obviously, friday the 13th.

Alex and his furniture at Kunstsalon in Arena

Later we went to the cinema to see new movie "Shortbus". It was great. Again, I was crying in the end, in the middle as well. All I can say is that we all have our demons, and we have to face them.
After the movie, as I was so touched and moved, we went to Zentralburo, where was an exhibition - part of the Pictoplasma Festival (about characters), which sounds cool, but seems superficial. And so was the exhibition as well. But the good thing was that there was a possibility to shoot a personalised character with paintball gun. I did, and that was a great feeling. I shot my demon.

My demon


Shooting...


Shot demon

Venice, beautiful but boring

I have finally finished my second article about Venice Biennale of Architecture. Altogether there will/are be 3 articles: one for Czas Kultury (art magazine from Poznan) - I already sent it, and I guess it is cool, because I could have freely criticise the polish pavilion. Second article is for VOX (design magazine in Poznan). This one I have just finished! And last article (deadline on Oct 15th!) is about China and Biennale for Architektura & Biznes (architectural magazine from Cracow, hopefully they will pay me this time!), and there they didn't want any critic on polish pavilion... they asked if I know any foreign journalist who would write about it, so I asked Berlin based Arch plus, but of course nobody would write about the wonderful polish pavilion. Probably nobody even saw it. Why would anybody see it? I mean, who cares? There were so few people at the opening, maybe because polish architects do not like to travel to foreign countries? Maybe because the opening speach was only in Polish? Maybe the Zacheta curators don't have many foreign friends so non of them came for the opening?


The opening of the polish pavilion at the Architecture Biennale in Venice, 2006. In case, Kozakiewicz is the guy in white shirt. The women are... curators and organisers from our Zacheta Gallery from Warsaw.
Poland is represented by an artist (!) Jaroslaw Kozakiewicz who showed his project "TRANSFER", well made presentation of a walking path suspended above dirty and noisy Warsaw streets. Sounds cool, and in some ways it is an elegant project, but on the other hand, we have already seen such projects, we have even made similar on architectural workshops as students. Ok, maybe not in Poland, but in differnt countries. But hey, remember? we have to catch up with architecture of the western world, we have been isolated in Poland by the bad communists, for many years.
As this project is visually "nice" it is also from environmental point of view... hm, a bit banal and pessimistic. If in the city, which has already huge urban problems with pollution, with messy communication and transport system, the only solution is to make another structure instead of solving the problems at the source, then thit is a sad idea. Pimples should be healed and cleaned with clearasil not covered with make up. But who would listen to me?

Bad Summer

Last night we went to a premiere of a new german movie "Summer 04". I have never been on a premiere... I know only Adobe Premiere... so it was cool, but the movie sucks. It is very hard to find a good german movie although it is possible. But this one... It was unbelivable! Bad plot, un-understandable characters, unmoral and stupid. Don't go to the cinema to see it. Waste of money! Ok, I have seen it, but then, it was for free.

the art is burning

First of all, I want to recommend a new movie "The House is burning" (2006) directed by a german guy (who would expect?!) Ernst Holger... no, it is Holger Ernst. It is a hard social drama, about american teenagers... it starts sad and hardcore and ends even worse. And I cried in the end. Well, that is not so unusual for me, I cried also on Terminator 2... long time ago.

Architektura intymna

Anna Krenz, untitled, 2006
"Architektura intymna - architektura porzucona" (Intimate architecture - abbandoned architecture) was a group exhibition I took part in. It has just finished in the Galerie Kronika in Bytom. There is no english text about it, so I paste few words in polish (as a comment on this post) and if I have more time I will translate it into english... Curators: Sarmen Belgarian, Katarzyna Burza, Małgorzata Kozioł.

Andreas, the Gallerist

While walking around all art fairs in Berlin, I noticed that the name "Andreas" in a gallery name makes it sound good and somehow cool. I started to think about it and found at least two: Andreas Engler Galerie and Andreas Wendt Galerie. Both cool. A gallery with let's say... "Jürgen ... Galerie" woudn't sound so great. I quess it is the letter "A" in a first name that makes it cool. for example Anselm Drescher Galerie sounds better than Jürgen Drescher Galerie. Is there a system in it?

Do I really hate Mondays?

Simple question. I have been working today as mad, making a website for a friend of mine, another polish artist in Berlin. I didn't finish it of course. Tomorrow is another day.

Good night...

Ok, I am going home now... after a long long day at the gallery. I was following a bit what is happening in Poland now (I am Polish, did I mentioned?)... about 3 political parades in Warsaw, which took place today... 3 different political parties have organised separate events... this is a Muppet Show there, well, Pupper Show... so for good night I attach my recent drawing "Warsaw by night" (for those who don't know, we have twins in Poland - one is the president and the other a premier, and as kids they played in a movie "About the two, who stole the moon"). Sweet dreams!

Shanghai disappears... well...

Disappearing Shanghai, Photo: Howard W French

Rainer Jakob, Howard W French and Jan Kaltofen, at the opening at ZERO. Rainer and Jan have made the whole exhibition possible and they established our contact to Mr French.

Ah, today is the last day of a very cool exhibition we have here at ZERO. "Disappearing Shanghai" by Howard W French, Shanghai Bureau Chief of New York Times. Now all photos will travel to Cambodia and after that to Berkeley.

Finally...

There we go! I have finally decided to have my own blog. I am completely exhausted after the Kunstsalon, an art fair in Berlin, in which we (Galerie ZERO) took part last week. It went well, I was quite happy about our stand, the atmosphere, the ART and people whom I met.