She graduated from Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk where she obtained PhD title. She is a post-conceptual artist, director, and stage designer. Multiple scholarships holder from Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and Culture Foundation. She has been exhibited, among others, at Brooklyn Museum of Art, NKB and Kunstwerke in Berlin, Museum on the Seam in Israel, Casino Luxembourg in Luxembourg, CCA in Moscow, Riga, Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle in Warsaw, and Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw. Her works are in prestigious art collections, including Hauser & Wirth, FRAC Poitou-Charentes, Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, Signs of Time Szczecin, Lublin, Olsztyn, European Parliament Collection, Silesian Art Museum Collection, National Museum in Warsaw. Her films are appreciated and awarded with prizes in Poland and abroad.
“The General and the Girl”, 2019
video, 34’43’’
Anna Baumgart deals with video, sculpture, installation, performance, photography, and artistic tattoo. In her art, she takes up the subject of social roles, authority relations, and the position of women in contemporary culture. “The General and the Girl” video is an impression about the life of Arajaryr Moreira de Campos – a partner and a secretary of Humberto Delgado, a Portuguese revolutionary general murdered by the regime of António Salazar in 1965. Today, Delgado’s name as a national hero appears in the name of Portugal’s largest airport. The surname of Arajaryr, who died along with the general, was removed from “Delgado” Wikipedia article. The reason for the change made states that the fame of the general does not make de Campos famous.
Both in this performance and in the entire work Baumgart explores the sphere of social relations, relationships between the public and the private. She does so by claiming the excluded, pointing to the patriarchal account of history where there is often no place for women contributing and working for the success of their partners. Thus, Baumgart asks a question about historical justice and the principle of democracy itself, about the figure of a woman seen as a “stranger”, who, as a weaker, less significant element, is removed from history and memory.
In the literary layer, the performance uses drama text of Wiktor Rusin commissioned by the artist.
