Viewing Room

Wednesday, 04 September 2024

Zofia Kulik

Zofia Kulik

Garden (Libera and Flowers) 11, 1996
60 x 50 cm
Archival pigment print

Zofia Kulik is one of the most famous Polish conceptual artists, known for her black and white photomontages that often combine political criticism with a feminist perspective. Thematically, she focuses on the relationship of man and woman, the individual and the mass, as well as on symbols of power and totalitarianism. A further pivotal part of her work is the phenomenon of mass-media, and its influence on consumers.

In the Garden (Libera and Flowers) series Zofia Kulik used collected flowers from her garden and photographed them arranged on the black and white photos of Zbigniew Libera. These images that are part of the Archive of Gestures include around 700 photographs of him in various poses taken from the history of iconography. She subordinates each composition to the specific character of the photographed plant. Poppies, roses, iris leaves or lime-tree flowers form heraldic arrangements in which the artist gives priority to the sexual vitality of the naked model. The same floral ornaments were already used by Kulik in her earlier works. Their geometric arrangements may bring French formal gardens into ones mind, where everything is precisely designed, and trees and bushes are trimmed into artificial regular shapes.