Bio / English

Gabriela Warzycka-Tutak (b. 1988) – visual artist and curator, graduate of the Faculty of Graphic Arts (2013) and PhD studies at the Gdańsk Academy of Fine Arts (2017). She has been directing the GGM1 gallery, a branch of the Gdańsk City Gallery (GGM), since 2016. She sees artistic and curatorial works as complementary means of creative expression based on dialogue. In art, she looks for possibilities of individual expression as well as the opportunity for an encounter. She likes to combine different fields and domains in her artistic practice. Born in Nowy Sącz, she lives and works in Gdańsk.

Gabriela’s initial works and exhibitions gave impression of having been meticulously planned and created in a controlled environment, also by the selection of specific media, for instance the complex gravure printing technique. Precision and finitude of the message prevailed over spontaneity of creation. With time, this approach yielded to the need for authenticity, where expression without self-censorship became a goal in itself.

“Maternity changed my perspective. I started looking at myself and the world of art with more calmness and presence. My focus shifted to the process of creation as such, and that allowed me to free myself from expectations regarding the final result and become open to chance”, says Gabriela. One change led to another as she decided to abandon techniques that slowed down or took control over her creative process. Currently, the artist prefers to work with pencils and crayons, choosing smaller formats and inserting words into her work. She is particularly inspired by fashion.

Gabriela debuted as a curator during the Gdańsk Interference Festival (2015-2017), of which she was also a co-creator. Shortly after that, she started working at the Gdańsk City Gallery. “It was a surprise – I hadn’t thought of becoming a curator, but I decided to give it a try,” she says and admits that the job turned out to be very rewarding. Subsequent exhibitions and collaborations allowed her to grow and build her curator’s orientation. Her studied and elaborate exhibits with scenographic flair and high artistic quality immediately caught attention of the media and viewers. After several years, Gabriela’s perspective changed, which also affected her as an artist. “The turning point was The Bare Belly – the exhibition which I did with Dominika Olszowy. It was very personal and revealing, and required opening to new approaches and new artistic means.” Currently, in her exhibitions she focuses mostly on the authenticity of the message, where understatement and apparent lack of development allow her the necessary space for freedom and imagination.

Texts have become an important aspect of her work. “When I started my work as a curator, I had to learn to talk about art of other artists. This was tough, because for a long time I felt I was using a language that wasn’t mine – a language that required something from me. After some time, I managed to reject all the self-evident truths and find my own language.” With time, words have become part of her artistic practice: apart from writing about exhibitions at the Gdańsk City Gallery, she also introduces text to her art, as language has become for her one of the elements of artistic expression.

When asked what she is looking for in art, Gabriela answers without hesitation: “Relationships, energy, the feeling that you can meet and learn from one another in art and through art.” Her activities as an artist and curator create a dimension of certain unreality, in which the sensual world is permeated with personal intuition. This borderless poetic space resembles a child’s playground, allowing for exploration and encouraging expression – but also becoming a meeting place.

Gabriela’s artistic perspective is non-linear: it is more associated with cubic capacity and intensification of the volume of inner experience. Her art emerges at the intersection of various trajectories, contexts and media, where the extremities of the Beskids meet the Baltic Sea: the feeling that the wide horizon is infinite and nature overwhelming. In this way, her art becomes a space of personal search and questions that remain unanswered. Because if nothing ends, and everything transforms, what do we really know?

AWARDS / SCHOLARSHIPS

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Scholarship of the Mayor of Gdańsk, 2016
1st Award of the Marshal of the Pomeranian Voivodeship in the Pomeranian Graphic of the Year contest, 2013