Artur Żmijewski, elogio del corpo imperfetto

The artistic work of Artur Żmijewski, one of the best-known contemporary Polish artists, is often bold and provocative, playing with the strongest emotions with brutality and at the same time proposing itself as a political and ethical action. The protagonists of Żmijewski’s video and photographic installations are fragile, imperfect, mutilated bodies (Oko za oko), annihilated by suffering (Karolina), old people singing in hospital beds (Nasz śpiewnik), and people occupied with something impossible and incongruous (Lekcja śpiewu). The artistic scenario presented reflects somehow both the world and Poland, it is archaic and contemporary, and characterised by an almost religious pietas combined with a form of poetic insubordination and a ruthless critique of the forms of politics and biopolitics.