The exhibition „Ćwiczenia z podzwyczajności” [Exercises in Sub-ordinariness] presented a study of the body in space, focusing on the relationship between the body and social norms, with particular attention to deviations from these norms. An “elastic band in a pocket” – a metaphor for human discomfort in everyday situations – prompted the creation of a tender relationship with one's own unintended gestures. Galeria Pracownia Wschodnia transformed into an experiential field, the effect of which was further enhanced by the presence of performers in the exhibition space. The exhibition also documented the creative process, revealing its transparent, communal character. The research approach and collective practices served to expand the field of art and build relationships between creative individuals and the audience. The exhibition took place from 16 May to 6 June 2025.

My first step is going into the field, which allows me to change perspectives and look for worlds. I observe various cognitive aspects accompanying research, whether immersed in corporeality or scientific precision.

Krysia Jędrzejewska-Szmek

The exhibition shows interspecies relations, human-plant relations from various perspectives. Some works arise from the need to re-evaluate the scientific, biological approach of the researcher who organises and names. In others, looking at plants and "with plants" is a way of commenting on phenomena, both political and global. From a personal perspective, it is a space of quiet reflection and freedom, making it possible to search for other ways of experiencing what is often a difficult "reality".

Curator: Paulina Mirowska

Collaboration: Kasper Jakubowski, Mateusz Olszewski Zaumne, Hamza Aqrabawi, Łukasz Zembaty/PHU Sitex, Marek Sadowski

The exhibition Cieplarnia [Hothouse] presented works by Mikołaj Chylak, Anna Grochowska, Anna Grzymała, Piotr Kopik, Natan Kryszk, Paulina Mirowska, Maryna Sakowska, Julek Płoski, Kacper Tomaszewski, and Sasza Wiktor. The works explored the metaphor of the hothouse as a protected space conducive to artistic development and collaboration, but also as a place for contemplation on the threats facing independent creative practice. The inspiration came from the fear of losing Pracownia Wschodnia, while the installation itself, built by Piotr Kopik and Natan Kryszk, formed an artistic microclimate where the artists freely co-created the space.

The exhibition posed the questions: how to create places that will serve as artistic greenhouses, where ideas of unconstrained creativity, exchange, dialogue, freedom, and non-hierarchy can be nurtured safely? Can they be protected from sudden shifts in political and business conditions? Is it at all possible to create ideal circumstances for the emergence and development of art? Can content and ideas regarding the tensions of the outside world be developed within isolated, hothouse conditions? The exhibition symbolically celebrated the renewal of Pracownia Wschodnia’s lease.

It ran from 13 September to 10 November 2024 and was part of FRINGE Warszawa 2024. Collaborations included:

• Staromiejski Dom Kultury
• Instytut Adama Mickiewicza
• Bęc Zmiana
• Magazyn KMAG
• Magazyn MINT
• Magazyn MOST
• Magazyn SZUM

The exhibition “Stoję tu na stromym zboczu” [I Stand Here on a Steep Slope] presented dialogue, cooperation and co-creation. Artists from Galeria Pracownia Wschodnia each invited one person to participate, and the works were presented in pairs, each accompanied by a joint, co-written text. The participants included: Antek Lisowski + Natalia Borczi, Jan Cieślak + Mikołaj Starowieyski, Mikołaj Chylak + Paweł Mysera, Paulina Mirowska + Klara Woźniak, Jędrek Owsiński + Ania Siekierska, Natak Kryszk + Paulina Koleśnikowa, and Piotr Kopik + Olga Lubacz.

The exhibition ran from 7 March to 19 April 2024. 

Kafka wanted his works to be destroyed, but Brod saved them – thanks to which we know them today. Did Kafka need a friend? Perhaps deep down he knew that Brod would not listen to him?

Curatorial care was provided by Antek Lisowski and Janek Cieślak, and the poster was designed by Janek Cieślak. 

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GDZIE KTOŚ ROBI - TAM KTOŚ PATRZY [WHERE SOMEONE MAKES - THERE SOMEONE LOOKS]

It was a record of an experiment. Although each person adopted a different strategy and working model, most of the artists creating Pracownia Wschodnia had experience of sharing a common studio. Such a situation had its drawbacks and advantages. On the one hand, space had to be negotiated, someone else's work not stepped on, and a colleague's difficult music accepted. On the other hand, much could be gained by squeezing into a single box: art materials moved from hand to hand, and ideas, fragments of conversations, and opinions circulated similarly. The open workshop remained ready to come alive in an instant and spit out an unexpected combination. And then fall silent again.

The ambiguity of this place's name - Galeria Pracownia Wschodnia - was reflected in the project. We wanted to be a studio and a gallery at the same time. For three weeks, we transformed the exhibition space into a workshop to spend time together and observe each other at work. Discovering how artworks were created stripped them of their aura of untouchability. The tension between the creator's decisions and the role of chance became more visible. The shift in perspective was attractive because it shortened the distance between the artist and the viewer. Conversation at the exhibition could be more relaxed, unpretentious, and direct.

Poster: Michał Kasperek

Accompanying events

• 17 February - Antek Lisowski "nabijanie płótna" [stretching canvas]
• 18 February - Jan Cieślak "malowanie malarza" [painting the painter]
• 24 February - Antek Lisowski "nabijanie płótna"
• 25 February - Jan Cieślak "martwa natura" [still life]
• 2 March - Paulina Mirowska "sito z martwą" [screen printing with still life]
• 3 March - Łukasz Zembaty "sito z martwą"
• 8 March - Tymek Bryndal concert "You should do something with that laugh"
• 10 March - Tomasz Januchta concert "Urodziny Arcydziełka" [Birthday of the Little Masterpiece]

The exhibition took place from 17 February to 28 March 2024.

Kontemplacyjna twórczość Kasi Rysiak stanowiła kontrast wobec rozemocjonowanego mainstreamu malarskiego. Poszukiwanie harmonii i spokoju w budowaniu relacji przestrzennych pomiędzy płaszczyznami barw i tekstur, wektorami linii – malowanych, wycinanych, naklejanych i wyszywanych – wynikało u artystki z fenomenologicznych badań nad doświadczeniem relacji obrazów do otoczenia, ich rezonowania w przestrzeni, współbrzmienia w zgrupowaniu z innymi pracami, czy wreszcie oddziaływania po pierwsze na artystkę, a następnie na widzów.
Działania Rysiak nasuwały natychmiastowe skojarzenia ze spuścizną konstruktywizmu, np. Kompozycjami architektonicznymi Władysława Strzemińskiego, przywodząc także na myśl Kąty energetyczne Józefa Robakowskiego, abstrakcyjne efemery Michała Budnego czy fascynację czernią u Rafała Bujnowskiego. Obaj artyści lubili posługiwać się węglem – u Kasi jego opiłki nadawały subtelną fakturę i walor przypruszonym szarością geometrycznym kompozycjom.
Wprowadzając aspekt poetyckiego minimalizmu, artystka przenosiła akcent na to, co pomiędzy, na marginesie, w kącie czy wręcz poza obrazem. Motyw cienia rzucanego przez obraz był osobnym tematem, asumptem do powstania nowego cyklu prac. Poprzez zastosowane materiały i techniki jak np. introligatorskie płótno czy tekturę stosowane w oprawach książek, dokonywało się swoiste uwznioślenie rzemiosła.
Ten minimalistyczny, awangardowy etos został u Rysiak podważony drobnymi, choć subwersywnymi gestami, wprowadzającymi wrażenie lekkości, ulotności i delikatności. Półprzezroczyste woale układające się w warstwowe, reliefowe kompozycje, element swobody w podejściu do kompozycji malowanej i haftowanej na fragmencie luźno zwisającej tkaniny, wyzierający nieoczekiwanie spod kompozycji neonowy kolor czy wreszcie płótna, z których wyłaziły łaskoczące oko niteczki – wprowadzały element eksperymentu i zabawy, zachęcającej widzów do uważniejszego spojrzenia, a także rozgoszczenia się w stworzonej przez artystkę sytuacji.

The exhibition ran from 26 October to 5 November 2023.

The theme of the exhibition was a grocery shop. 

The people invited to the exhibition presented objects that tell stories about the products we buy constantly.

The exhibition of male and female students of the 2nd Studio of the Basics of Photography, ASP Warsaw, Faculty of Graphic Arts, entitled “Dawno i nieprawda” (Once Upon a Time and Not True), presented works resulting from the transformation of a spectrum of experiences, both beautiful and painful, which, as they passed, became fleeting memories or stayed relatively longer. The exhibition, running from 28 June to 9 July 2023, invited reflection on the irreversibility of time and fading into oblivion, telling a story of deteriorating moments metaphorised by a piece of wallpaper peeling off the wall or the continuous transformations of nature in the poem "Nothing Gold Can Stay" by Robert Frost:

Nature’s first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf’s a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

(Robert Frost, 1923)

Exhibiting: Aleksandra Wróbel / Bożena Niebój / Cyprian Szablak / Emil Laska / Kasia Phan / Laura Pietras / Maja Rogocka / Mikołaj Radecki / Mikołaj Soroczyński / Wiktoria Nowak / Wiktoria Solak / Zuza Radzikowska. Guest participation of 1st year Students of the 2nd Studio of the Basics of Photography at the ASP in Warsaw, Graphic Arts

Promotion: Cyprian Szablak

Supervision: Bożena Niebój

The exhibition ISSHIN presented works by Masafumi Koshio (JPN) and Olgierd Zbychorski (PL) from 21 to 26 June 2023. The works were created as a result of an intercontinental creative dialogue connecting abstraction with a concrete vision. On display were miniature Instax instant photographs, which were experiments with the medium and the light-sensitive emulsion, enriched with calligraphy. The effects resulted from intentional and uncontrolled actions, such as exposing the film to full sun or keeping it in the dark. The second part of the exhibition consisted of minimalist, abstract graphic forms obtained using the technique of motusgraphy – scanning graphic elements in motion. The works, in various configurations (single pieces, diptychs, triptychs, etc.), combined gesture and sign, line and point, in a digitally modified painterly gesture and a contemplative interpretation by a master of calligraphy.

Artists

Masafumi Koshio (JPN)

Hailing from and living in Shizuoka. Master and leader of a calligraphy school. Former president of the international association for the promotion of calligraphy Ichijikai. Performer of large-format calligraphy created in collaboration with musicians and dancers. He was also a landscape designer – Japanese gardens. He began learning calligraphy at the age of seven. From an early age, he sought to understand the foundations of Japanese arts: the "way" and the beauty of balance and disproportion. In 2021, he established the Ichijikai association, which also operates in Europe. "What will you experience in calligraphy? What will you do with calligraphy?" – Ichijukai primarily promoted calligraphy worldwide. An important stage in his creative journey was meeting Agnieszka Yokoe – a translator and promoter of Japanese culture in Poland, and Olgierd Zbychorski, with whom collaboration helped him find his new, European "way". In recent years, his works have been presented at exhibitions in Japan, China, Mongolia, as well as in Poland and Lithuania.

Olgierd Zbychorski (PL)

Originally from Sopot, living in Warsaw, a graduate of the University of Gdańsk. Author of articles on visual identity, applied graphics and color perception. Curator of modern painting exhibitions. Professionally associated with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute for several years. Passionate about graphic design, photography, and author of a weekly radio show presenting broadly understood electronic music and world music.