The presentation of Katarzyna Kozyra's works consists of two thematically related videos, which were made recently. The first of them uses the film material shot in the bathhouse for women in Budapest. It have been already shown in Warsaw whereas the other had its premiere in the Polish Pavilion during the International Art Biennial in Venice, where it was given the Honorary Award. It was this one that raised great controversy in Poland even before the first public screening. It was thought to have been a joke lacking good taste or some kind of provocation. Such an opinion was based on the fragmental information; among other things it was known that the author entered the bathhouse for men in disguise of a man. At the present moment the Polish audience has an opportunity to see and to estimate this work.

On four large screens one can observe the interior of the bathhouse with men and the author walking inside it. And on the monitor installed outside of the exhibition room the author will be shown in the course of characterising herself. Needless to say the creation of semblance of being someone else that she really is, looks like a grotesque. The preparation of the false usually leads to grotesque and it is obviously visible in the films by Katarzyna Kozyra. Despite "the disguise" her behaviour indicates her feeling of uneasiness and anxiety. She really looks like woman who using the artifice found herself in the space appropriate for men only. These film sequences create a metaphor for the situation of a person simulating to have an identity different from what he/she really has. At the same time we can assume that even though the camera operators were men (colleagues of the artist), the detailed and moderate editing allows the viewers to look at the men in the bathhouse through the eyes of woman who was there.

As far as the point of view is considered this installation from the men's bathhouse corresponds to the earlier one showing the women through the eyes of one of them. Those two screenings are complementary, the assumption that drew the author to work was different for both films, though. Both works raise the moral questions; the people were filmed by a hidden camera and without their proper consent. This problem we leave to the individual estimation of the spectators. But still there are some questions concerning the visual side of the creation.

Can we assume that this material does not show any important general truth? The people filmed in the bathhouses, especially the women look extremely different from what we can see while watching commercials or action films. When juxtaposed with the truth presented by Kozyra the fictional and idealised images prove to be trivial and indeed not human (they reject the real human shape as useless for the commercial "creation"). In both works presented there is no cynicism or sneer at the people shown. The nudity in this context has nothing to do with pornography. If one gets used to the reality of the bathhouse the artificial commercial productions will seem controversial, as they present fake people as the models for the real people. Watching the sequences registered in the bathhouses it is worthwhile to perceive that there is a need of acceptance of the real human and of the real us.

Grzegorz Borkowski

Katarzyna Kozyra was born in 1963 in Warsaw. She graduated from the sculpture department (the studio of Prof. Grzegorz Kowalski), Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. Her output constitutes a special phenomenon in the contemporary art in Poland. Her works have always raised the disputes in Polish mass media since her diploma "Pyramid of Animals" (1993). The discussions involve many people, the artists as well as those who are not professionally related to art. The realisations by Katarzyna Kozyra refer to the crucial problems of the contemporary culture taken up in such a way that excites emotions and reinforces reflection.

Note:
From 12th December 99 the exhibition is also available online (the web site of Magazyn Sztuki): http://www.magazynsztuki.home.pl
You can find there various texts on Kozyra's works. Links to press reviews and discussions lists, lots of unpublished previously photographs and the newest interview with the artist (by Ryszard Ziarkiewicz from Magazyn Sztuki) will be also available.
Moreover, at 3.25 p.m. on 20th December 1999 the film by Roza Fabianowska titled Biennale Sztuki w Wenecji 1999 will be shown by Polonia TV.