Festival of Art in Public Spaces

Elżbieta Jabłońska

Elżbieta Jabłońska (born 1970 in Olsztyn, lives in Bydgoszcz)

The artist in her works deals with the situation of women in Poland and the Polish Mother stereotype creating a critical commentary on the traditional gender divisions in a patriarchal society.Her works include paintings, drawings, graphic arts, photographs, installations and performances.

In 1990-1995 she studied at the Art Department of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń where she defended her thesis in graphic arts and drawing. Since 1996 she has been working in the Drawing Department of Toruń Univeristy. In 2003 she received Spojrzenia 2003 award given by Deutsche Bank Culture Foundation and the Zachęta National Gallery of Art.

In her works the artist focuses on everyday life, daily routine, activities like cooking, cleaning, bringing up children etc. It could be seen in the work entitled "Przez żołądek do serca" ("The way to a man's heart is through his stomach"), miniature pictures "Gdy Antek śpi" ("When Tony's sleeping"), enlarged kitchen in "Biały Mazur". The artist says she tries to enhance the everyday life and show its full dimension. She has created the alternative reality where a kitchen appears to be a magical land of a giant full of goodies and the leftovers in a sink tempt you with a feast of colour.A critical look of the artist is mixed with the affection for the details of everyday life and a great sense of humour.

In May 2002 during the 17th AMS Outdoors Gallery Elżbieta Jabłońska showed her work entitled "Gry domowe" ("Home Games"), which was a part of a larger project called "Supermatka" ("Supermother") which was then shown in Zachęta Gallery in Warsaw. Jabłońska appeared on the poster dressed as Superman surrounded by kitchen appliances with her son sitting on her lap. A cartoon hero was moved into the world of household duties. The artist referred to the myth of Polish Mother and contrasted it with the heroism of Superman who is selflessly saving the world. One year later, the artist realized the work called "Pomaganie" ("Helping") which began the activities aimed at motivating the people who are ruled out of society. She organized workshops for homeless people. She was inspired by a dramatic appeal of an unemployed woman looking for a job which she had read in the street. Jabłońska contacted her and paid her for embroidering the same text on a white cloth with a silver thread. It became a part of the installation- it lay on a cubic meter made from 60,000 professionally destroyed 100 PLN banknotes.