January 18th – March 15th 2014
exhibition curator: Agnieszka Stempin
In the course of excavations archaeologists hold hundreds of years in their hands. Sometimes – as was the case with the research carried out in Ostrów Tumski – the results astound even the discoverers themselves. The monumental sweep of the settlement’s fortified walls, the grand scale of the first Poznań fortress and the excellent state of preservation of oakwood constructions have stirred the minds of scholars as well as the imagination of artists. The thousand-year old material united both parties and so proved that there are many ways of seeking beauty in the past. For the archaeologists, the oak trunks disclosed valuable information throwing some light onto obscure areas of the distant past; as for the artists, they were able to give the same wood fragments a new lease of life by pervading them with modern contents and giving some substance to the symbolic encounter with the long-gone inhabitants of Poznań.
The 1000 years in necklaces exhibition is part of an interdisciplinary project THE MODERN BEAUTY OF ANCIENT WOOD, started by the Genius loci Archaeological Reserve in 2013 and continued into the present year. We have asked for the cooperation of Architecture Department, the Poznań Polytechnic, Sculpture and Spatial Events Department, University of Arts, and the P. Potworowski High School of Plastic Arts, Poznań. The aim of the enterprise was to emphasise the mediaeval engineering feat accomplished in the fortified walls of Ostrów Tumski and to offer artists an opportunity of a new look at history and a closer acquaintance with the past in a novel, exciting way. Sculptures, plastic installations and paintings inspired by the wood kindly made available by the Poznań Archaeological Museum inhabited the place.
Anna Orska Ph.D., a Poznań designer, who for many years has been presenting the amazed public with distinctive jewellery noted for the individual, frequently historic nature of the material used, joined the project and created a unique collection. The wooden stuff of which the earliest Poznań was made has returned under a new artistic guise. Starting with January 18th, the Genius loci Archaeological Reserve has been housing extraordinary and magnificent necklaces, each of them enclosing a moment of the city’s history: the relics of the oak tree discovered by archaeologists.
The exposition of designs made by Anna Orska is an invitation to an unusual get-together with history and a proposal to use artistic contemplation for a better understanding of the Ostrów Tumski phenomenon. The jewellery presented, modern in approach and sensitivity, maps out novel ways of yielding to our fascination for the past. When looking at these beautiful objects, it is worth remembering that each of the necklaces contains a contribution from the mediaeval builders of the city and state that were emerging at that time. The engineers and woodcutters from one thousand years back are the anonymous co-authors of the exhibition.
Archaeological Reserve Genius Loci is located on Ostrów Tumski – Posadzego Street 7, Poznań
