The aim of the exhibition is to present and contextualise a current tendency in contemporary art, and especially in painting. The artworks, mainly by artists of the middle-aged generation, are constantly revisiting familiar characters from the cartoons of the 1990s. It is an easily detected visual language that oscillates between abstraction and figuration, experimenting with the conscious blurring and interplay or even separation of these two poles. The works are assembled in a patchwork-like manner, based on iconic symbols, elements taken from popular culture and a combination of various artistic styles.

For this reason, the works, often based on elements taken from real-life imagery or everyday life, mostly from cartoons and comics, are both familiar and alienating. Everything seems to be in place, but there is something disquieting, something suspicious about them.

The absurd experience of recent years, the emergence of global problems and conflicts and increased digitalisation have been a heavy mental burden for the man who lost his footing. The exhibited artworks approach global or everyday problems that seriously affect societies in a light and playful way, with humour and (self-)irony. Adding a critical tone to the notion of “cuteness”, they encourage the audience to question perfectionism and kitsch mediated and represented mainly by social media.

The international selection will recall a transcontinental vision that reflects on the universality of art alongside globalisation.

Curators: MAJ Ajna, Jan ELANTKOWSKI