The State of Possession. The Topography of the MOCAK Collection - Part 1

The first part of a cycle presenting the MOCAK Collection is not a conventional survey of the holdings but an exhibition built on the experience of absence - of time, stability and resources. The museum’s whole team turns crisis into a tool of self-analysis, organising the show into five metaphorical chapters: Ruins, Nooks, Mud, Wardrobes and Springs.

MOCAK on the exhibition:

“Dust thou art, so get up and dust yourself off,” Rafał Wojaczek pronounces in Lech Majewski’s film, subverting the universally recognised encapsulation of the inevitable human fate. You won’t see the film at the exhibition State of Possession, just as you won’t see many other things. This exhibition is built upon the experience of absence: a lack of time and stability, and above all, a lack of financial resources - a lack resulting from the implosion of the institution’s budget and the depletion of the resources necessary to have carried out the planned activities. We, however - much like Wojaczek in his defiant assertion - are trying to harness this depletion, understood as a crisis, and find new, different models for working on an exhibition that engages with the MOCAK Collection.

What to expect

The exhibition is divided into five metaphorical chapters - Ruins, Nooks, Mud, Wardrobes and Springs - through which it tells the story of the Collection and of the institution itself at a moment of upheaval. It is a self-reflective portrait of the museum, prepared by its entire team, coinciding with the fifteenth anniversary of the first exhibition opened to the public at its current premises.

Tickets, opening hours, and current details are on the MOCAK website.

Museum profile: MOCAK Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow.