In 2005, Kristi Arnold, Elizabethtown College professor of art, spent a year in Krakow, Poland, as part of a Fulbright grant. She worked in the print shop of the Akademia Sztuk Pieknych (Academy of Fine Arts).
Since that time, Arnold has remained in contact with several artists she met at the academy, specifically Joanna Kaiser and Tomasz Daniec. So, in 2014, when Kaiser approached the E-town professor to help coordinate an exhibition exchange between U.S. artists and Polish artists, Arnold connected with New York City-based independent curator Jeff Edmonds to coordinate and curate the two exhibitions.
In exchange for “Tradition and Contemporaneity: Prints and Drawings from Krakow” at two venues in Pennsylvania, artists from the United States will exhibit their work at the International Cultural Center of Krakow this October.
“We worked closely with Shawn Williams at the Rose Lehrman Art Gallery at Harrisburg Area Community College on the first show that ran January 15 through February 12,” said Arnold. “The exhibition will travel to the College’s Hess Gallery for the final exhibition” Thursday, March 31, through Friday, May 20.
A reception will be held at 4 p.m. opening night.
The E-town exhibition is made possible with the support of a Project Stream Grant from the Pennsylvania Partners in the Arts (PPA).
With the aid of the grant, Polish artists, Kaiser and Daniec will travel to the College in April. They will present an artists’ talk, “Drawing, a New Perspective” from 11 a.m. to noon Wednesday, April 20, in the Brinser Lecture Hall in Steinman, in which they share their experiences of living in Krakow and teaching at the oldest fine arts academy in Poland.
The talk also focuses on the recent phenomenon of modern drawing that has gained momentum among many contemporary artists in Krakow. Examples of current student work from the professors’ advanced drawing classes will be discussed, as well as work from former students who have been successful since graduating from the academy.
An additional reception for the artists is planned for that evening in Hess Gallery.
Allie Sevareid ’18 and seniors Dante Weikel and Meghan Kreider, from the College’s Fine and Performing Arts Department, are designing a catalog, poster and postcards to promote the show.
Artist in the exhibition are:
Tomasz Daniec — printmaking, painting and drawing; winner of several international arts awards.
Joanna Kaiser — drawing, painting and printmaking; her work is exhibited in the Krakow City Historical Museum, Museum of Contemporary Art in Radom, Kate Kollwitz Museum in Berlin and the William Benton Museum in Storrs.
Bogdan Miga — printmaking; he is a multiple winner of the Best Print of the Month competition organized by the Union of Polish Visual Artists in Krakow and a recipient of the Special Award of the International Graphic Biennial in Split, as well as an honorary mention at the Polish Woodcut Quadriennal in Olsztyn.
Mateusz Otreba – exhibiting printmaking and drawing.
Henryk Ożóg — printmaking and painting; his works are executed using classical printing techniques.
Piotr Panasiewicz — printmaking, painting and graphic design; he is the holder of grants from Leipziger Lithographie Werkstatt and Leipziger Lichtdruck Werkstatt as well as the “Cyma” Artists’ Association and Galerie Chabin, Paris.
Marcin Surzycki — printmaking and drawing; he is the winner of several international arts awards and is a member of the Board of the Association of the International Print Triennial.
Krzysztof Tomalski — experimenting with his original technique of alintaglio; he is the winner of several international arts awards and his work is in museums in Krakow, Poland; Chicago, Illinois; Yunnan, China; and Kanagawa, Japan.
Darek Vasina — drawing, painting, printmaking and illustration; he is co-founder of Nieistniejaca Grupa Trzy Oczy and Gili-Gili.
Cost of the exhibit is free. Contact Amy Reynolds at 717-361-1212 or reynoldsa@etown.edu with any questions.