What was Polish critical art? What were the emotions that surrounded the exhibitions presented at the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art? What can press materials tell us about an artist’s life? We will find answers to these questions in the first of the three volumes of Art of Liberation. Press Study 1988–2018, a monumental project by Zbigniew Libera. Volume one, spanning the years 1988–1997, showed up in October 2019; the following two volumes (1998–2007 and 2008–2018) in 2020.

An authorial selection of press texts, an art book, a work of and on journalism and criticism, a documentation of an artist’s activities and of the transformations of Polish art institutions – a press study of Zbigniew Libera’s thirty years’ practice sheds light not only on his figure, but also on the art world itself, as seen against the background of social changes in transformation-era Poland.

The three-volume publication is a compilation of Polish and international press articles on Zbigniew Libera’s work. We will find out what were the main topics of the art-world discourses, what stirred the greatest controversy, and who was the critics’ darling. Indirectly, the clippings will offer insight into the condition of Polish art criticism and art institutions.

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moderator: Marek Wasilewski