Collection

Irena Kalicka

untitled from the series It’s hard to slay the dragon, but you must try (New Athens)

2016, photography, lambda print, 39,5 x 29,5 cm

In the photography series A Dragon Is Hard to Overcome, But One Must Try (New Athens), Irena Kalicka alludes to the vision of the world presented in New Athens (1745) by the priest Benedykt Chmielowski. This book, published at the threshold of the Enlightenment, is regarded as the first Polish general encyclopaedia. Intended as a scientific text, its overtones are more mediaeval. Its pages feature demons, witches, zombies and sphinxes, alongside monarchs and historical figures. This photograph, in which the artist herself poses on the deathbed surrounded by devils and sorceresses, is a commentary on Chmielowski’s entire encyclopaedia. Kalicka reconstructs ars moriendi, the art of dying, a popular motif in the Middle Ages. Forces of good and evil, in the form of angels and devils, approach the deathbed to fight over the soul of the departed, for its salvation or damnation. In the mediaeval view, a good death could redeem a bad life. In Kalicka’s depiction, this psychomachia is comic and is used to expose the internal inconsistency of the encyclopaedia, which turns out to be a fable. In the artist’s view, this is the very charm of New Athens, but it’s a controversial charm, aimed more at generating morbid sensation than conveying knowledge.

Irena Kalicka

b. 1986, Krakow

Photographer, filmmaker, collage artist. Graduate of the Faculty of Photography at the Łódź Film School. Kalicka often photographs improvised or staged situations, much like theatrical productions. She creates photographic tableaux vivants, presentations of canonical motifs from art history brought to life, in which the artist herself poses along with her friends. She alludes to literary and anthropological texts in her works, which also include numerous symbols, self-quotations, and mythological, religious and pop-culture references. She eagerly mixes orders and registers, incorporating kitsch and the aesthetics of intentional error. She uses stylized form to raise contemporary themes associated with identity and its stereotypical perception. She lives and works in Kraków.

b. 1986, Krakow

Photographer, filmmaker, collage artist. Graduate of the Faculty of Photography at the Łódź Film School. Kalicka often photographs improvised or staged situations, much like theatrical productions. She creates photographic tableaux vivants, presentations of canonical motifs from art history brought to life, in which the artist herself poses along with her friends. She alludes to literary and anthropological texts in her works, which also include numerous symbols, self-quotations, and mythological, religious and pop-culture references. She eagerly mixes orders and registers, incorporating kitsch and the aesthetics of intentional error. She uses stylized form to raise contemporary themes associated with identity and its stereotypical perception. She lives and works in Kraków.

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