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Katarína Poliačiková

Katarína Poliačiková

area: Fine Art, Multimedia

Key Facts

nationality

Slovakia

area

Fine Art, Multimedia

residence

Bratislava

recommending institution

tranzit.org/ERSTE Stiftung

time period

May 2015 - May 2015

Born in 1982, Katarina Poliacikova finished her PhD at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava in 2013. She has shown her work in Berlin, Prague, Vienna and New York, among others. In 2011, she was shortlisted for the Oskar Cepan Award (a part of The YVAA awards in Central Europe and the Balkans). She participated in art residency programs in Prague, Budapest, New York, Warsaw and Graz. She lives and works in Bratislava.

Solo Exhibitions
2015 (upcoming) Jiri Svestka Gallery, Berlin
2013 Until we remember the same, Open Source Gallery, New York, USA
2013 The way geologist liberated in time, she thought, astronomers are freed by space, Plusminusnula Gallery, Zilina, Slovakia
2013 Triple Sun, Photoport Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia
2013 Sonntag, Jiri Svestka Gallery, Berlin
2011 Vertical Narratives, Jiri Svestka Gallery, Prague, Czech Republic

Selected group exhibitions
2015 Tectonics of Memory, House of Arts, Brno, Czech Republic
2014 Truth And Void Between Realities, Baginsky Gallery, Lisbon, Portugal
2014 Past-Present-Past, Karlin Studios, Prague, Czech Republic
2014 Inflammatory state/Survival Festival, Wroclaw, Poland
2013 Romantic Apprehensions, Metamatic:taf, Athens, Greece
2013 Studio works, Open Gallery, Bratislava
2013 Perfection, Pradelna - space for contemporary art, Bohnice, Czech Republic
2012 Fragments of Unspoken Thoughts, Jakopic Gallery, Ljublana, Slovenia
2012 Film. Directed by artists / film in contemporary art, Nitra Gallery, Nitra, Slovakia
2012 6th Zlin Youth Salon 2012, The Gallery of Fine Arts in Zlin, Czech Republic
2011 The Discovery of Slowness, Tabacka Kulturfabrik, Kosice, Slovakia
2011 Oskar Cepan Award 2011, Cvernovka Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia
2011 On the threshold, Jiri Svestka Gallery, Berlin, Germany
2011 In optima forma, Emil Filla Gallery, Usti nad Labem, Czech Republic
2010 Economy of Unwanted Amity, Karlin studios, Prague, Czech Republic
2009 ESSL AWARD CEE 2009 Winners, Essl Museum, Klosterneuburg/Wien, Austria
2009 DONUMENTA 2009, Kunstforum Ostdeutsche Galerie, Regensburg, Germany
2009 ESSL AWARD CCE 2009 nominees exhibition, Gallery Medium, Bratislava, Slovakia

Katarína Poliačiková

Projectinfo

“Unfinished lines” is a project I have recently started working on and I’m planning to carry out during my residency at MQ.
As many of my previous artworks, “Unfinished lines” has evolved from found material connected with subjective memory and family history. Once again, I’m digging into the past in order to convey it and create a new context for what might have been lost.
The basis for “Unfinished lines” is a folder of drawings my grandmother had created during her high school studies in the 1930’s. These are about 30 pages of different clothes patterns, beautifully executed with incredible precision. For me, this material is interesting not only as it is, but foremost, because these designs had never been realized into real clothes. My grandmother was obliged to quit the school after the second year, because of the family circumstances.
These drawings and their unfulfilled potential have triggered my thoughts for some time already and have provoked many questions. My desire is to examine their place nowadays, especially in the context of my artwork.
There is a whole constellation of issues I aim to explore: about unrealized lives, carriers, dreams, projects lingering on the shelves. Thinking about the journey across two generations and clothes themselves, our everyday “architecture” which slowly takes the shape of our bodies, while at the same time, we often strive to fit ourselves into them. “Unfinished lines” is about memory which wears off. Through all these gestures I aim to open up a new space and provoke questions, rather than completing my grandmother’s “project.”

Documentation

During my stays artists residencies, I usually apply a particular mode of research - rather then coming with a specific project to be realized, I become an observer and collector. I carry my themes with me and the temporary change of place helps me to find new perspectives on the topics I deal with. During my stay at MQ, I was mainly collecting material for which I will find further use in my future artistic practice. I discovered that Vienna is an infinite resource of thrift and antique stores, and one of my findings was Oskar Kunhardt’s book “Wanderjahre eines jungen hamburger Kaufmannes - eine Reise um die Welt in 1000 Tagen”, published in 1902. This inspiring material is full of photographs with peculiar quality - seeing the world through the eyes of a traveler more than one hundred years ago. As the medium of photography is my main subject, I look at these from the perspective of today’s traveler - imagining Oskar Kunhardt, traveling around the world with heavy equipment and facing only restricted possibilities regarding the number of images to be taken, mistakes to be made. Yet, only through facing all those decisions, it was possible for the book to survive and gain value over the decades. I look at these photographs in contrast with mindless pressing of the shutter of today’s traveler, leading to innumerable images never to be look at again. Pondering on how the travel photography has changed over one century is my starting point when considering this book as material to work with.

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