The meetings will take place a part of the Programme of the Artistic Residence of the Municipal Gallery bwa in Bydgoszcz. Tom Swoboda’s project “Zooscape” explores the landscape of the zoo, where all activities aim to replace, complement or (certainly) loosely interpret the perception of landscape – nature. An artist’s exhibition will be held at the end. Anyone wishing to find out more about the project and the artist himself is invited to the meeting (Thursday, March 14th, 6pm).
In his practice, the artist often focuses on issues that, historically or by their very nature, have come to an end or have no raison d’être, and can only be reconstructed from a position of memory, conversation or intuition. He wants to reach, he says, the actual experience, the language, the anatomy of the body, or the territory. Thus, projects with specific identities are created that are not clearly established in the field of art or in the broader social space (non-sports, non-architecture, non-religion).
During recent years, the artist has been focusing on the analytical and research project Animal Space. In it, he documents human-designed wildlife living spaces. He is mainly interested in architectural interpretations of native places, nature transferred to cages, aviaries for animals placed in zoos. The project can be read as a direct kind of photographic document. On the other hand, the photographs correlate heavily with Renaissance painting, still life, ironically pointing to the ever-present interspecies conflict.
Tom Swoboda – visual artist. He studied at the Faculty of Sculpture of the Academy of Fine Arts in Wrocław and the Study of Old Japanese Culture in Rybnik. In 2023, he completed his doctoral studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice. Co-founder and co-manager of Szara Gallery in Cieszyn, co-founder of The Undergrand Art Centre in Clitheroe, UK. Originator, curator of the international art residency project Incidents in Cieszyn, Český Těšín, Czechia, Bielsko-Biała and Wakefield, UK (2006). Artist in residence, lecturer in the art department at Wrexham Glyndwr University, Wales, UK (2007). Fellow of the Artist in Times of Hopelessness project. The latest selection of Polish art (2015) BWA Gallery in Wrocław, curatorial selection by Zbigniew Libera. Co-founder of Gallery 12 in Cieszyn (2017). Co-founder of the School of Art and Thinking in Cieszyn (2010-2023) and lecturer in drawing, photography, multimedia and 3D object creation. Finalist in the international Sony World Photography Awards (2018), finalist in the international LensCulture Portrait Awards (2018). Originator and co-founder of the international artist residency programme in collaboration with The Association of Icelandic Visual Artists (SIM) Iceland. He lives and works in Cieszyn.
The artist’s creative residency: 12-26.03.2024, 10-17.04.2024
curator: Danuta Milewska
14.03.2024, 6pm
20 Gdańska St.