In the year 2019-2020, Artur Żmijewski collaborated with the POLIN Museum to create a temporary exhibition "Tu Muranów" (Here is Muranów), dedicated to the history of that Warsaw district, which was home to the largest Jewish community in Europe for centuries. He co-created his works with Zofia Waślicka-Żmijewska, a researcher in the field of the memory of the Holocaust, and with substantive help and consultation of prof. Jacek Leociak, a specialist at the Polish Center for Holocaust Research, the originator of the exhibition and co-author of its concept.
The collection "Muranów w obiektywie Artura Żmijewskiego" (Muranów through the lens of Artur Żmijewski) is a presentation of works that were part of the exhibition and those that were not. The first set includes selected photographs, colour and black and white ones, that are part of the work "Szukaliśmy w popiołach" (We searched in the ashes) and a set of three photographs entitled "Słońca" (The Suns). The second set consists of a series of 26 black and white digital photos taken with a wide-angle lens and a video "Gdzie są Nalewki" (Where is Nalewki Street?).
"Szukaliśmy w popiołach” is a set of five videos and 12 photographs. They were created with the use of archaeological objects in the collection of the POLIN Museum - everyday objects that belonged to Jewish residents of Muranów found during the construction of the POLIN Museum, such as scissors, a watch, a teapot, a thermometer or a perfume bottle. In the works by Artur Żmijewski, those objects - now, archaeological items on which time has left its mark - are "brought back to life" by being placed in their natural setting: in a tailor's shop, at the local watchmaker's or on a cooker. In the case of the photographs, that context is achieved thanks to the arranged composition, while in the case of black-and-white videos, shot in the style of pre-war cinema, it is the image and sound. The artist's idea was to show that those objects are material witnesses to the life of the Jewish community in Muranów and its extermination. In the words of the authors: "They shared the fate of the district and its residents".
"Słońca" is a set of 3 photographs that were created, just like the installation "Szukaliśmy w popiołach", with the use of an archaeological object. It is a glass lid, presented in 3 different shots of the scenery of Muranów, the place where hundreds of thousands of Jews lived and suffered. This object, illuminated by rays of light, becomes "the Sun" and takes on a symbolic meaning.
The series of photographs "Bez tytułu" (Untitled) shows snapshots of places within the boundaries of the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II. Old architecture, preserved or rebuilt, co-exists with modern buildings, street buildings, tramway tracks and traffic. Frames with curves, characteristic of that technique, give the photographs a journalistic character and create the feeling of observing reality "through a viewfinder".
As part of that project, the video, "Gdzie są Nalewki?", was shot using a drone. The slow narrative of the video follows the Nalewki Street, which no longer exists, along its historical route. Before World War II, this street was one of the most important routes in the city, the main thoroughfare of the Jewish Northern District, also known as the Nalewkowsko-Muranowska district. During the war, the buildings at the street were destroyed and never rebuilt. Some part of that route has survived in the form of today's Stare Nalewki Street (until 2019, Bohaterów Getta Street). The video, shot during the Covid-19 pandemic, is also a record of an empty city, deprived of normal urban life due to the necessary isolation of its residents, which - although it was not the author's intention - brings to mind the Holocaust of the Jewish inhabitants of Muranów.
Artur Żmijewski (born in 1966, in Warsaw) - a visual artist, expressing himself primarily through multimedia and video. One of the leading representatives of critical art in Poland. Although the artist graduated from the Faculty of Sculpture, he chose photography and film as a creative methods of expression, arguing: ""Today, I don't create sculptures - I create videos - the world is too complicated to create sculptures. In fact, it's enough to take a few photographs to notice that sculpture can't keep up. Photography and film have eliminated my faith in the possibilities of sculpture, they have ridiculed it"". Artur Żmijewski represented Poland at the 51st Art Exhibition in Venice (2005), he received a prestigious award, Ordway Prize, from Creative Link for the Arts and the New Museum in New York (2010) and the Jerzy Stajuda Prize for Art Criticism (2013). His works were presented on a number of collective and individual exhibitions around the world, they can be found in renowned institutional collections.
In his works, he explores issues related to very different areas of the human condition and existence, particularly those considered difficult and often rejected as taboo. His works are very often controversial, explore the limits of what an artist is allowed to do, provoke the need to dispute and address the presented subject. One of the artist's areas of interest are historical events, including the traumatic issues of the Holocaust and their echo, as well as difficult Polish-Jewish relations. The works dealing with the above-mentioned topics are videos: ""Berek"" (The game of tag) (1999), the so-called ""Tryptyk izraelski"" (Israeli triptych) - ""Itzik"", ""Lisa"", ""Nasz śpiewnik"" (Our Songbook) (2003), ""80064"" (2004) and ""Polak w szafie"" (A Pole in a closet) (2006).
Małgorzata Bogdańska-Krzyżanek
