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Pamela Bożek

born 1991, Stargard

Student of Environmental Doctoral Studies and a graduate of the Faculty of Sculpture at Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow; laureate of the scholarship of Ministry of Culture and National Heritage (2019) and the 2nd edition of Bogna Olszewska scholarship (2019); initiator and facilitator of Notesy z Łukowa (Notebooks from Łuków) bookbinding microbrand. She deals with participatory post-artistic practices and visual issues in the context of mechanisms of exclusion and stigmatisation.

 

“Lifeline”, 2018
photography, acrylic plates

In June 2018, the Maltese government stated that it had no competence to accept “Lifeline” lifeboat into the port of Valletta. On board there were 239 people rescued in the Mediterranean. It was not the first or the only situation in which overcrowded and deprived of humanitarian aid ships are sent to another European country. It was all a part of the policy of sealing borders. Amongst the rescued there were 14 women. Valletta, like many European capitals, is subject to intense gentrification. As a result, the delightful architecture is directly adjacent to many ruined abandoned tenements. During artistic residence as part of the European Capital of Culture project, the artist’s attention was drawn to the common practice of naming residential buildings – on most tenements on the right side of the front door there is a plate with name of the house or the name of its male of female patron. The artist chose 14 female names popular in Eritrea and Somalia and put them on ordered plates – thus, she named empty homes in Valletta with these names.
The work is accompanied by “Your Things” fabric created as part of tailor workshop of artist’s idea at the Centre for Foreigners in Łuków. The workshops were carried out thanks to a mini-grant of FemFund Feminist Fund and in cooperation with “Dla Ziemi” Association. In her artistic practice, the artist often initiates and engages in social activities, which gives her works participatory character.