The future is in the bones. Underpinning the biological and cultural condition of humanity, they serve as both organic building blocks and carriers of meaning. They are the most enduring element of the human body, the only thing that remains of it after death, something that is an integral part of the process of ceasing to be human, transforming the body through various metamorphoses.

 

With the development of ever more sophisticated technologies, we can imagine that what is dead will increasingly and extensively become useful organic material, blurring the line between the living and the dead.

According to Ewa Domańska, human bodies are transformed into something non-human after death*. The remains, as organic collective entities, reveal the multi-species identity and communal nature of biological matter. The ontology of the dead body highlights its capacity for connection and the creation of new forms of kinship based on shared substance. It is both a real, material and dynamic entity and a process of continuous transformation, demonstrating the limitless potential for change.

 

After death, the body turns into an Other. A materialist understanding of life and death has led to dead bodies being seen as organic remnants belonging to Nature. This has given rise to ideas of using bodies as fertiliser and practices of 'cleansing' spaces of the dead – disposing of corpses to protect the health of the living*. Remains gain value based on what can be made of them or done with them, both symbolically and materially. What is dead begins to play a central role in sustaining earthly existence. To live is to enter into relationships and maintain the potential for transformation: of oneself and one's surroundings.

 

Artists demonstrate ways of thinking that are driven by the impressions generated by the inanimate body and its impact on reality. They bring reflection on the dead body closer and offer insight into the reality of the living. Operating within the categories of foreignness or adaptation, they creatively discover their limitations in order to free themselves from them. Objects elude binary divisions, appearing as something vague and indeterminate. They point to visuality, intertwining themes of primitiveness, decay and horror as aesthetic conventions. Referring to the ontology of the dead body, they expose the processes that death entails and reveal the possibilities of future biological diversification.

 

The exhibition manifests life as inseparable from matter. It employs what is dead to investigate what is real. It uses the deadness of bodies as a specific state that proves visually compelling, allowing a shift from aesthetic reflection to ontological contemplation. Dead bodies dissolve the boundary between culture and nature, becoming an inseparable element of the world-making process. Remains become beings – a kind of meta-community that has its own agency within the eco-necro framework.

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Vague visual entanglements provoke transgressions, engage with multiple themes simultaneously, and convey the multidimensional structure

of contemporary reality. The exhibition weaves an ambiguous narrative about the corpse as a symbol of non-being and a harbinger of impending decay. Engraved ornaments, sweaty fabrics and rippling folds of skin crumble in the hands, scattering the dust of things and events and revealing the presence of other life.

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_____

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*E. Domańska, Nekros: Wprowadzenie do ontologii martwego ciała, Warszawa 2017, p. 45.​

**Ibid., p. 129.

 

 

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Curator of the exhibition and author of the text: Kamil Mizgala

Visual identity: Nebula Puff [C]

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Czaro Malinkiewicz (b. 1999)

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Graduate of experimental film (Academy of Art in Szczecin) currently a student of intermedia (University of Arts in Poznan). In his artistic practice he looks at what is dusty and deeply hidden in the attic. His main field of interest is pop culture, cinematography, the role of the prop, horror history, conspiracy theories and the relationship between a phenomenon and its documentation. I work mainly with silicon and waste. He creates camp, non-obvious objects and short video forms.

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Zuza Piekoszewska-Smith (b. 1996)

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Represented by the Łęctwo gallery from Poznań. Her practice evokes a sense of transience that never ends in death, as well as memories and echoes of past fundamental energies. She has shown her work at the Zachęta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw, the Art Museum in Lodz and abroad. She lives and works in Poznan.

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Mikolaj Sobotka (b. 1997)

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Lives and works in Warsaw, where he received his master's degree in 2024 from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw at the department of graphic design. His work includes sculpture and printmaking, but the artist does not limit himself to these forms. He operates with a complex visual code that combines a variety of cultural phenomena. He has participated in several exhibitions, including “Near Darkness 2/NearDark 2” by Łęctwo Gallery during Warsaw Gallery Weekend or “All my brothers I've ever killed” at How to Forget Gallery in 2024.

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Marek Wodzislawski (b. 1985)

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Lives and works in Katowice. Graduate of painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice, currently a doctoral student at the Intermedia Department of the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow. He is interested in trans-species narratives, materiality of life, post-evolution and prosthetic body extensions. He creates installations, videos, photographs and experiments with the biological medium. He has participated in solo and group exhibitions in Poland and abroad.

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Nebula Puff [C] (Klaudia Jeleńska) (b. 2002) 

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An interdisciplinary artist, her work includes video, lettering, 3D modeling, creating virtual environments and engineering video games, audiovisual installations, sculpture, drawing and painting. The artist creates imagined alternative realities, using the tools of new technologies to expand and transform the perception of the world. She explores future landscapes and oneirism, questioning the division between the real and virtual worlds.