Mimicry

topic for the first year of master’s studies

2021/2022

Kuba Stępień

video, 2021

The video is a documentation of a choreography performed in untied sports shoes, based on a few basic ballet positions. Shot in a tight frame, the movement affects the object and the object affects the body. Repeated endlessly, the minimalist arrangement opens up space for emotion. The figure and its binary external perception are transformed by its own expression. It becomes fluid, unclear, at the same time conquering its own visibility and the legibility of cultural codes through movement, despite its maneuvering between two stereotypical images, where representation turns into self-presentation, creating a fluid performance of image and
perforation of “truths” about oneself. In an image focused on one part of the body, we can see the ease of balancing between norms, retro types and meanings, and the irrational potential of purging the object of its ideologically inscribed function and reversing it, giving it new revolutionary meanings.

Joanna Klikowicz

Smile mask

video, 2”24′, 2021


Smiling seems to be an unquestionably positive signal. However, what is the revealing of teeth that takes place on this occasion? Obviously, such mimicry is associated with aggression. Studying this phenomenon allows us to discover that smiling is connected with primitive strategies (not only in the world of people) of coping with threatening situations. Monkeys make
sounds similar to human laughter when driving out an intruder. Aggression is based on the opposition between those who laugh and those who are laughed at. The person or persons being ridiculed are symbolically excluded from the community. Exclusion from the group is a phenomenon that originally threatened survival. That is why mimicry is so prevalent; we laugh together with others, even if we do not really feel the need to do so. We show our teeth, we become just as threatening. We put on a mask of a fake smile in order not to be excluded.

Kaja Róg

collage set, format A3, 2021
In times of modern technology we strive to maximize the quality of our lives. Various treatments and surgeries aim to improve our appearance or
functioning. This work is a reflection on the laser vision correction surgery, during which one of our senses is cut off for a moment. The procedure takes place without anaesthesia and we participate in the process of improving our field of vision the whole time.

2020/2021

Marcelina Gorczyńska

Home video

video, 1’50”, 2020

Recordings made using a webcam during a video call. By following instructions, the callers show themselves, their homes and what they have in them. Lifting feet off the ground, disappearing, struggling – it all happens in their living room.

Lena Pierga

JACKPOT

video, 4’58”, 2021

The piece is focused on the exploration of one’s body in the context of externally imposed models and expectations. I take part in an involuntary draw; a lottery that cannot be won. I continually repeat and modify the gestures of belonging and promise. I copy previously studied poses which, after all, do not give me any power or agency.

Marta Matysiak

Cops and thieves
video, 2’42”, 2020
Remembering the innocent play of my childhood, I wanted to draw attention to the harmful image of the patriarchal world. In the film, I also talk about the pop-culture theme of the “princess and knight”, which grew on patriarchal foundations and inconspicuously guides the social awareness of objectifying women from an early age. The memory evokes in a black vacuum. The same one where I locked it in my mind. I am in a
dialogue with myself. It all takes the form of self-therapy. By using simple body language, I take on the features of “stronger” and “masculine” with whom I would like to be equal.

2019/2020

Łukasz Horbów

#Polishnails

photographs, 2019

How i can be more polish?

Jakub Oleś

human 2.0

video, 5’16”, 2019

Changes in the apperance are only a matter of a new setting of certain parameters in the graphic program, implementation of the algorithm of the mechanized surgeon. In an individualized approach, however, they lead to the improvement of properties of a middle-aged man, bringing him closer to full satisfaction with his physical form.

Polina Kamarova

Letters of different sizes: people with an artistic disposition.

video, 11″05′, 2019

Letters of different sizes: people with an artistic disposition.
Return to childhood and your efforts to develop your own style of writing that can define unique character traits. I turn to graphology, psychological analysis of the writing, which determines who we are based on the way we write.

Luiza Grądziel

video, 1’29”, 2019

The work presents the creation of some kind of armor. A seemingly obvious
and commonly known activity, such as doing makeup, becomes a shield that hides complexes but not only on the visual level. It’s the way to divert
attention from internal weaknesses, simultaneously emphasizing the features by which we begin to be perceived in another way that is right for us.

2017/2018

Małgorzata Rumińska

video, 1’25”, 2017

Human as a sociable species adjusts his behaviors to his surroundings – in a more or less aware way. In specific situations he uses specific gestures, does similar activities. I focused on social meetings, as a casual form of coexistence.

Paweł Olejnik

three-channel video, 2018

Mimicry is imitation, uncontrolled desire to be someone else, someone better.It is a situation in which the weaker unit takes on the features stronger in order to survive, function, deter, signal ostensible power.

The three-channel video installation of Paweł Olejnik consist of several dozen advertising slogans spoken by British native speakers. Advertising slogans stripped of logos and aesthetic form play the role of life councils that could be spoken by our parents, grandparents. Slogans are characterized by an imperative with which it is difficult to argue.
The perception of ourselves as similar to the stronger induces in us the feeling of social promotion.