Other creative works - Curated Exhibition
Tales within historical spaces: Beata Batorowicz [QUT Art Museum]
QUT Art Museum (Brisbane, Australia, 01-Sep-2012–28-Oct-2012)
Queensland University of Technology
2012
Abstract
A major exhibition of the work of Polish born Beata Batorowicz that travelled to Poland. Project managed and contributed to a 100-page bi-lingual (English/Polish) publication of the same title.
Research Background
For ten years, Polish born Australian artist Beata Batorowicz has been exploring the history of Polish/German experiences of WWII in her artwork by drawing upon European mythology, folklore and fairytales, the work of Joseph Beuys, and stories told by her grandmother about her families experience of escaping Poland during the war. This exhibition brought together a selection of Batorowicz’s sculptures, photographs and illustrations that deal with these ideas to consider how interweaving personal narratives with ‘big’ history can be a way of sensitively engaging with the traumas of cultural memory.
Research Contribution
This exhibition drew out the voice of the individual, a perspective that is often buried in the collective telling of big histories. Quotes from family oral histories collected by the artist, and fictional narratives written by the artist were included throughout the exhibition. This framed the artworks by constructing the exhibition like a three-dimensional fairytale book. This approach highlighted the complexities of a universal truth in the telling of history, and the tension between fact and fiction facilitated a distancing for the viewer from the horror of what is a painful subject. The exhibition also contributed to new knowledge in that the project was inspired by a very little-known collection of children's stories, Fairy tales from Auschwitz (Bajki z Auschwitz) that were secretly written and illustrated by Polish prisoners of war in concentration camps for their children.
Research Significance
The exhibition was presented at QUT Art Museum, Queensland and was attended by over 3500 people and travelled to the Eugeniusz Geppert Academy of Art and Design, Wroclaw, Poland. The exhibition was accompanied by a 90-page bi-lingual (English/Polish) publication of the same title, supported by Arts Queensland. The exhibition had good media coverage and received a number of positive critical reviews including in leading Australian art magazine, Artlink. The exhibition was supported by a number of public programs including an artist talk and professional development session for teachers.
Details
- Title
- Tales within historical spaces: Beata Batorowicz [QUT Art Museum]
- Authors
- Vanessa Van Ooyen (Curator)Megan L Williams (Curator) - Queensland University of Technology
- Event details
- QUT Art Museum (Brisbane, Australia, 01-Sep-2012–28-Oct-2012)
- Publisher
- Queensland University of Technology
- Date published
- 2012
- Organisation Unit
- Community Engagement
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99451262702621
- Output Type
- Other creative works; Curated Exhibition
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