Like an insect spinning its cocoon thicker and more resistant, her mind would go on strengthening the thin partition, the danger spot of her being.
Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky
The exhibition of two artists who are divided by a number of things, from opposite sex to cultural traditions in which they grew up. Their works are put together to tell a coherent, sensual tale of the drama of the body seen as a place of experience and the need to find security.
What is the body? Is it just a translucent screen of cultural projections, or is it also a tangible medium of experiencing the world? Perhaps what unites is contained in what gives birth to trauma, what is pushed into taboos, what we exclude and what excludes us?
The drawings by the Moroccan artist Hajar Moussa and the installations of hammock cocoons and paintings by Michał Korchowiec tell the drama of lust and suffering. They create a story about biologicality, the loss of body, identity and about being on hold. The exhibition about the fascination with the body and life, learned through pain, at the same time examines the fears and the need for security, escape, building you own nest and stability in the whirlwind of events, on which you no longer have influence.
Michał KORCHOWIEC (born in 1987) graduated from painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow. Polish set designer, visual artist, film director and producer. He paints, creates video art and installations. His works have been featured in a number of individual and group shows. He is the author of several theatric scenographies for which he received many awards, including Jan Swiderski’s prize, Leon Schiller’s prize or prize for Best Set Design of The Divine Comedy Festival in Cracow. He created a visual world for the plays of Monika Strzępka and Paweł Demirski (Non-Divine Comedy, Everything I will tell to God, Curse, The Battle of Warsaw 1920, In the name of James S., Courtney Love); of Wiktor Rubin and Jola Janiczak (Gorgonowa’s Case, Detroit. The history of hand); of Jack Poniedziałek (Glass Menagerie, Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf?) or Salka Valka directed by Yana Ross in Borgarlekhusid in Reykiavik.
Hajar MOUSSA [HomosapiensUnisex] is an illustrator and horror graphic novelist. She studied Comics at the Institute of Fine Arts (Tetouan, Morocco), focusing on prostitution and witchcraft in Morocco (2006-2011). Hajar became a Fulbright Scholar for a Master Degree in Comics & Graphic Novels in one of the most haunted cities in The USA: Savannah, Giorgia. After finishing her studies at the Savannah College of Art & Design (2011-2013), where she continued to explore the world of prostitution, transvestism and black magic, she decided to study theology at the University of Geneva, in order to better understand & decipher the religious codes and social genders. Since she was a child, Hajar Moussa has been a lover of cartoons and a big fan of Black Metal music. It follows her in her journeys, travels and work. The illustrator lives and works in Morocco, designing clothes and jewelry under the name of The Unholy Series.
The exhibition is part of the program The coffees I will not have, co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, from the Fund for Promotion of Culture, and by the City of Szczecin.
