Program

Who said that just by looking you can see? Sometimes it is even worth covering your eyes to open up to new non-visual ways of reading art. If you do not see, are afraid of contemporary art, do not understand it, or are simply tired of the dozens of pictures that surround you, maybe it is worth trying to experience art differently? In our workshops, we cover our eyes and learn to experience art sensually. We engage the sense of smell, hearing, and touch to feel and understand. Join us during one of the two workshops – each is a separate meeting, you don’t have to participate in both.

We also invite people with visual disabilities! We provide assistance in reaching the workshop site from the close vicinity.

Bartek Lis is a culture animator, curator of social projects, educator,  and sociologist associated with the CK Zamek culture centre in Poznań. Originator of the Blind Art project, which became a “pandemic” development of the concept of the sensual workshop that he carried out for five years at the Wrocław Contemporary Museum together with Magdalena Skowrońska, based on the idea of ​​a non-visual, sensual experience of art, one that does not only require looking. Lis believes that art can be an interesting pretext to discuss various topics, and coming into contact with it does not have to mean only a visual adventure. Accessibility as an important aspect of cultural work is understood as a universal category that includes everyone, regardless of any experienced “lack” or disability.

Magdalena Skowrońska is art historian and psychotherapist. Between 2014 and 2017, she was the Public Programme Curator at the Wrocław Contemporary Museum. In 2015–2017, she lectured in the Faculty of Art Mediation of the Eugeniusz Geppert Academy of Fine Arts in Wrocław. Since 2014, together with artist Patrycja Mastej, Skowrońska has been developing and curating interactive exhibitions, including those from the Self-Service Museum series. Since 2018, she is an active member of On Dream, a design-and-art duo that organizes exhibitions devoted to the multi-sensory perception of art.

Workshop site: BWA Zielona Góra

The number of participants is limited for technical reasons.

Workshop duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable clothing.

I strongly believe in psychoanalysis, which in turn believes in the power of stories and even words. Motives for writing are not a matter of talent, but of an internal need to play, to transform what is into what is not yet. It is about the form in which you communicate something very important to the rest of the world. Apart from the other benefits or functions, it is really very nice. Let’s do it. During the workshop we will invent the queer history of Zielona Góra, using our experiences, thoughts, and dreams. We will fantasize about places, times and ourselves. We will write it down, individually and together. We will see what comes of it, maybe a map made of urban and emotional tissue, an exchange of experiences and words. A queer noncommittal record close to our bodies. Don’t think about whether you have talent or not, because that’s not the point – coming up with things that aren’t there is the most fun thing in the world. This is why children play. Fun, i.e. a safe balance between fantasy and what is real, cannot go wrong.

The number of participants is limited to 10 persons.

Marta Konarzewska is a scriptwriter, literary studies scholar, cultural researcher, and an author of texts of various genres and forms. She works as a dramaturge with the Helena Modrzejewska Stary Theatre in Kraków. Author of the script of Olga Chajdas’s award-winning film Nina, a female love story. Co-author, with Piotr Pacewicz, of the book Zakazane miłości. Seksualność i inne tabu [Forbidden loves. Sexuality and other taboos], a collection of interviews with and testimonies of persons of various genders and sexualities.

Workshop site: BWA Zielona Góra

The number of participants is limited. To sign up, please refer to the Facebook event description

During a two-hour walk we will get to know Bohaterów Westerplatte Street. Formerly off the beaten track, rarely frequented Topolowa Street became the main artery of Zielona Góra in the Polish People’s Republic. Its surroundings also changed dramatically. In place of the demolished pre-war houses, the Zielona Góra “city” was created. We will tell you how this street and its surroundings have changed over the last hundred years, as well as about the plans that have not been implemented.

Szymon Płóciennik is a journalist at Gazeta Wyborcza in Zielona Góra. Initiator of walking tours, organized since 2017, around the city’s winemaking landmarks. Meeting point: by the Heroes of the Second World War Memorial, Plac Bohaterów

Subjective guided tour of selected Biennale spaces by Daniel Kotowski

Walk will be moderated in Polish Sign Language and translated into phonic Polish by Marta Jaroń

Meeting point: BWA Zielona Góra

Walk duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable shoes and warm clothing.

The aim of the workshop is an attempt to transform spaces in Zielona Góra that are inaccessible to many people: people with disabilities, Deaf people, elderly people, caregivers with children, chronically ill people, LGBTQIA+ people, i.e. all those whose names are missing from the names of streets, squares, or plazas. Over three days, we will jointly develop a strategy for occupying public space and will look for ways to challenge the normative and inaccessible environment. With attention to individual needs and in an atmosphere of mutual concern we will decide with motion(lessness) and voice how to transform the inaccessible topography of the city. We will expand it, change it, and tear it down if necessary.

During the workshop, we will try to find answers to the following questions:

• Where and how can I occupy a space that is inaccessible to me or in which I am not present?
• What is a non-normative body in a normative space?

During three meetings we will use exercises to work with the body (improvisation, authentic movement), breathing, and voice; we will move around different spaces and work with props. Together, we will try to develop a safe space for the exchange of experiences and dialogue about different ways of expressing ourselves. The workshop will conclude with a performance presented by the participants.

FOR WHOM:

The number of participants is limited to max. 14 persons of any fitness level or age.

WHEN:

28 Oct (Friday), 17.00–20.00

29 Oct 202 (Saturday), 10.00–18.00, including a 1-hour lunch break

30 Oct 2022 (Sunday), 10.00–14.00

Moderators:

Katarzyna Żeglicka is a genderqueer crip theatre pedagogue, cultural animator, performer, and choreographer; a feminist and queer activist; a certified instructor of WenDo, a self-defence and assertiveness course for women and girls; a career adviser and work trainer. She has completed a stage choreography course under the guidance of Iwona Olszowska and gained competence in the field of dance and inclusiveness in Poland, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Italy. In 2020, during the Rezydenci w rezydencji programme at the CK Zamek in Poznań, she co-staged, with Antek Kurjata, the show Gra w kontra-s-TY. Her new project, Dzikorosła, has secured funding from the City of Kraków (2022). Laureate of the Europe Beyond Access competition for the etude Rezonans kontrastu (2021), which she has presented in Kathmandu (2019), among other places. She has performed in the shows Poruszenie and PokaZ 21 and in the video performance Poza kwarantanną. For over 20 years, she has been working with people who experience discrimination and violence, running workshops and laboratories in the field of body work, anti-discrimination, violence, empowerment, and inclusiveness. She works with cultural institutions, universities, and non-governmental organizations. Founder and president of the association Stowarzyszenie Strefa Wenus z Milo (2014–2020), member of the Kolektyw Artykuł 6 collective.

Antek Kurjata is an actor, dancer, and occupational therapist at the Warsztat Terapii Zajęciowej Przylesie. Graduate of the Manchester Metropolitan University, the Pieśń  Kozła Theatre in Wrocław, and holder of a Diploma in Physical Theatre Practice from Adam Smith College, Scotland. Participant of many theatre and dance workshops, he has appeared in numerous stage productions in Poland abroad, e.g. Marta Górnicka’s Requiemaszyna, Monika Smekot’s delayScape, or Natura Morte by the Russian troupe Derevo. Co-founder and actor of the Polish-Scottish theatre Gappad in Glasgow. Ex-member of the Jubilo artist collective working with projects for people at risk of social exclusion. He ran a series theatre-and-movement workshops for persons with disabilities as part of the project 5 zmysłów. EKSPRESJA. Organizer of movement workshops for children with families and for persons with motor or intellectual disabilities, e.g. koloRaki, a theatre-and-music workshop for deaf and hearing-impaired young people. Participant of Dance and Disability: Crossing the Borders, a series of dance labs organized by the Institute of Music and Dance and British Council (2019–2021). Since 2020, associated with the Tak dla Samodzielności Foundation, which runs training homes and offers assistance services to persons with intellectual disability. Puppeteer in the educational project Teatr lalek z niepełnosprawnością. Artist-in-residence at the CK Zamek in Poznań in 2022.

Workshop site: BWA Zielona Góra

The number of participants is limited. To sign up, please refer to the Facebook event description

Nature reserves are semi-wild green areas in the city centre that at first glance seem to have no function. Nothing could be more wrong – each of them can be a green public space. They often have their history related to the urban concept of a garden city developed in pre-war Zielona Góra or they are simply the result of changes in the urban space over the years.

During the outing, we will try to walk the longest possible section of the route away from busy streets, moving from one green oasis to the next. We will discover the area adjacent to Bohaterów Westerplatte Street from the west and north.

Anna Mazurkiewicz is an interdisciplinary artist, cultural and social animator, and educator. She graduated from the Institute of Visual Arts and the Faculty of History at the University of Zielona Góra. Author of  photographs and films, promoter and participant of the electronic music scene. A wild nature lover and futurist, she loves to discover alternative city routes.

Meeting point: green square by the Business Centre (Bohaterów Westerplatte / Chopina Street)

Walk duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable shoes and warm clothing.

A subjective walk through selected spaces of the Zielona Góra Art Biennale. We invite everyone, especially visually impaired people, to join the guided tour prepared jointly by two educators who offer their own interpretations of selected works. We will use audio descriptions, typhlographics, and loose associations, and sometimes we will guide the hand to enable a tactile experience of art.

Małgorzata Dobrucka is an educator associated with BWA Zielona Góra, a cultural animator, and artist.

Bartek Lis is a cultural animator, curator of community projects, educator, and sociologist associated with the CK Zamek culture centre in Poznań.

Meeting point: BWA Zielona Góra

Walk duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable shoes and warm clothing.

It’s nice to listen to experienced guides talking about the history of cities, squares, and neighbourhoods. Sometimes, however, we are curious about these smaller stories – narratives about ordinary people, everyday life, work, love etc. that can be passed on by the city’s residents. These are their subjective stories with which we can disagree and may want to discuss them. We invited a group of elderly residents of Zielona Góra to share their memories with us. We also asked them to lead a walking tour. Join us and share your memories of Bohaterów Westerplatte Street.

Walk led by students of the University of the Third Age in Zielona Góra

Meeting point: to be announced in the Facebook event description

Walk duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable shoes and warm clothing.

We walk many times along Bohaterów Westerplatte Street, which is the main artery of Zielona Góra. We know the personal history of this city, the memories of this street. But do we consider how this major thoroughfare is organized? Is it equally accessible to all residents? During the walk, we will cover our eyes to see what blind and visually impaired people have to deal with every day, what difficulties they encounter in public space.

Dariusz Wojciechowski graduated from the Mikołaj Kopernik University in Toruń with a degree in Philosophy; a poet and photographer. Four years ago, due to a very rare autoimmunological disease, he lost eyesight almost completely. He works with the foundation Szansa. Jesteśmy Razem.

Meeting point: to be announced in the Facebook event description

Walk duration: approx. 90 minutes. Please wear comfortable shoes and warm clothing.