70 x 100 cm
Archival pigment print
“Cheerleader” was conceived as a pop video to the music and words of the Gwen Stefani song “What You Waiting For?” The scenes unfold in a typical men's locker room, evoking clichés of femininity and masculinity. In the beginning the young, fit men do not pay the slightest attention to Kozyra, the attractive, singing and dancing cheerleader. But when she reappears in her nude, obese, female opera singer costume, the thong-clad athletes stand at full attention. The video explores, amongst others, the problems of the body as a costume and of one's own identity that have frequently been the artist's preoccupation.
105 x 70 cm
Archival pigment print
Archival pigment print
Archival pigment print
Photograph
The photographic series, as well as the video recordings of the performance "Fressen" shows Kozyra's artistic re-enactment of the Landshut Wedding (1475), one of the most important political events in German-Polish history. The arranged marriage between the Polish princess Jadwiga Jagiellonka and the Bavarian prince George the Rich was considered the greatest feast of the Middle Ages, surpassing every other banquet at the time. Besides the subjects of nudity and gluttony, which are of particular interest to the artist and have been treated in several of her previous performances, Fressen (German for ‘guzzling’) focuses on the many aspects of food culture: in its ability to create social connections beyond national borders, despite language barriers or political differences. The culinary sphere is one of the most essential parts and basis for human interaction. The different relations of giving and receiving, serving and consuming between strangers, friends, or family members all play their part in initiating a space of encounter. The significance of Fressen thus lies within the collective experience of eating, sharing, and feasting together.
Photograph
The photographic series, as well as the video recordings of the performance "Fressen" shows Kozyra's artistic re-enactment of the Landshut Wedding (1475), one of the most important political events in German-Polish history. The arranged marriage between the Polish princess Jadwiga Jagiellonka and the Bavarian prince George the Rich was considered the greatest feast of the Middle Ages, surpassing every other banquet at the time. Besides the subjects of nudity and gluttony, which are of particular interest to the artist and have been treated in several of her previous performances, Fressen (German for ‘guzzling’) focuses on the many aspects of food culture: in its ability to create social connections beyond national borders, despite language barriers or political differences. The culinary sphere is one of the most essential parts and basis for human interaction. The different relations of giving and receiving, serving and consuming between strangers, friends, or family members all play their part in initiating a space of encounter. The significance of Fressen thus lies within the collective experience of eating, sharing, and feasting together.
166 x 308 cm
Photograph
In photographs from the series Homo Quadrupeds (2018) naked men are led on a leash by burqa-clad women who tame their instincts. This is a reference to the legend of unicorn, in which only a virgin could tame the wild animal. While the women meet during the walk, the dogs sniff each other and seek to dominate. It is no longer only a matter of freeing women from male domination, as in the performance Aus der Mappe der Hündigkeit (From the Portfolio of Doggishness, 1968) by VALIE EXPORT and Peter Weibel, in which Weibel obediently waddled at the artist’s side. Kozyra expands the feminist approach with a political aspect: the dogs in her work, played by Arabs and Americans, are aggressive and ready to jump down each other’s throats any minute. Kozyra might therefore have more in common with Oleg Kulik, who attacks the establishment in his performances as a dog (literally!), but also dreams of a non-anthropocentric, ecological society and fights for democracy.
160 x 217 cm
Photograph
In photographs from the series Homo Quadrupeds (2018) naked men are led on a leash by burqa-clad women who tame their instincts. This is a reference to the legend of unicorn, in which only a virgin could tame the wild animal. While the women meet during the walk, the dogs sniff each other and seek to dominate. It is no longer only a matter of freeing women from male domination, as in the performance Aus der Mappe der Hündigkeit (From the Portfolio of Doggishness, 1968) by VALIE EXPORT and Peter Weibel, in which Weibel obediently waddled at the artist’s side. Kozyra expands the feminist approach with a political aspect: the dogs in her work, played by Arabs and Americans, are aggressive and ready to jump down each other’s throats any minute. Kozyra might therefore have more in common with Oleg Kulik, who attacks the establishment in his performances as a dog (literally!), but also dreams of a non-anthropocentric, ecological society and fights for democracy.
164 x 217 cm
Photograph
In photographs from the series Homo Quadrupeds (2018) naked men are led on a leash by burqa-clad women who tame their instincts. This is a reference to the legend of unicorn, in which only a virgin could tame the wild animal. While the women meet during the walk, the dogs sniff each other and seek to dominate. It is no longer only a matter of freeing women from male domination, as in the performance Aus der Mappe der Hündigkeit (From the Portfolio of Doggishness, 1968) by VALIE EXPORT and Peter Weibel, in which Weibel obediently waddled at the artist’s side. Kozyra expands the feminist approach with a political aspect: the dogs in her work, played by Arabs and Americans, are aggressive and ready to jump down each other’s throats any minute. Kozyra might therefore have more in common with Oleg Kulik, who attacks the establishment in his performances as a dog (literally!), but also dreams of a non-anthropocentric, ecological society and fights for democracy.
90 x 60 cm
Photograph
In a video and a photographic series created at the Schwarzenberg Palace in Vienna, Kozyra plays the role of Lou Salomé – an intellectual and a femme fatal, friend of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud and Reiner Maria Rilke. In Kozyra’s interpretation, Nietzsche and Rilke are subjected to training as two dogs led on a leash by Salomé, again played by Kozyra, who walks them through the palace halls and takes them out to the gardens. The series Lou Salomé was created in 2005, but has never been displayed publicly in its entirety.
90 x 67 cm
Photograph
In a video and a photographic series created at the Schwarzenberg Palace in Vienna, Kozyra plays the role of Lou Salomé – an intellectual and a femme fatal, friend of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud and Reiner Maria Rilke. In Kozyra’s interpretation, Nietzsche and Rilke are subjected to training as two dogs led on a leash by Salomé, again played by Kozyra, who walks them through the palace halls and takes them out to the gardens. The series Lou Salomé was created in 2005, but has never been displayed publicly in its entirety.
60 x 90 cm
Photograph
In a video and a photographic series created at the Schwarzenberg Palace in Vienna, Kozyra plays the role of Lou Salomé – an intellectual and a femme fatal, friend of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud and Reiner Maria Rilke. In Kozyra’s interpretation, Nietzsche and Rilke are subjected to training as two dogs led on a leash by Salomé, again played by Kozyra, who walks them through the palace halls and takes them out to the gardens. The series Lou Salomé was created in 2005, but has never been displayed publicly in its entirety.
60 x 90 cm
Photograph
In a video and a photographic series created at the Schwarzenberg Palace in Vienna, Kozyra plays the role of Lou Salomé – an intellectual and a femme fatal, friend of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud and Reiner Maria Rilke. In Kozyra’s interpretation, Nietzsche and Rilke are subjected to training as two dogs led on a leash by Salomé, again played by Kozyra, who walks them through the palace halls and takes them out to the gardens. The series Lou Salomé was created in 2005, but has never been displayed publicly in its entirety.
150 x 200 cm
C-Print
The series Women Are Waiting is a study of the aging body. Kozyra started working already with older women in 1994. Her interest in the body and the passing of time resulted from Kozyra’s need to familiarize herself with the changes occurring in the body under the influence of disease or time and her personal situation when she was suffering from leukemia, a type of cancer. The search for older women who would volunteer to pose naked in front of a young girl holding a camera, the convincing process and finally the photographing took almost five years. Eventually this search was reflected in her most well-known work Women’s Bathhouse.
150 x 200 cm
C-Print
The series Women Are Waiting is a study of the aging body. Kozyra started working already with older women in 1994. Her interest in the body and the passing of time resulted from Kozyra’s need to familiarize herself with the changes occurring in the body under the influence of disease or time and her personal situation when she was suffering from leukemia, a type of cancer. The search for older women who would volunteer to pose naked in front of a young girl holding a camera, the convincing process and finally the photographing took almost five years. Eventually this search was reflected in her most well-known work Women’s Bathhouse.
100 x 100 cm
Photograph
Katarzyna Kozyra's work Blood Ties consists of four photographs and is based on an antithesis between religion and the human being impersonated by the display of naked female bodies: the two laying sisters are juxtaposed with huge religious symbols of Islam and Christianity in the background. These dominant blood-red colored emblems form the majority of the composition with their shade and size. By their symbolic character, they can be switched easily from one work to another and be read as "the devil's signs" representing the evil in everything. The struggle to justify someone's religious values in terms of feminism syncs with this metaphor. Religion as a male-dominated terrain is criticized alongside the general masculinization of power while the female union of sisterhood contrasts against this patriarchy and fights the depiction of a woman as a subject. Furthermore, the protagonists' familistic relationship builds another struggle that can be found throughout society: sibling rivalry tied by blood.
Gallery
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