Agnieszka Brzeżańska, Ewa Ciepielewska and HUNITI GOLDOX: On Water, Flow and Warped Time

“Time flows differently on the water”—Agnieszka Brzeżańska in an interview by Karol Radziszewski

On Water, Flow and Warped Time is a group exhibition that features work by Agnieszka Brzeżańska, Ewa Ciepielewska, and artist duo HUNITI GOLDOX (Areej Huniti & Eliza Goldox). In this exhibition we examine the relations between rivers, circular time and capitalist systems. 

In our Western society, time is seen as a linear process revolving around growth and progress. More than ever, humanity is focused on productivity and time management. But how do we experience time in our current society? Can we move through the world differently? The exhibition On Water, Flow and Warped Time focuses on water(ways) as entities from which we can learn to live together in alternative ways, against capitalist notions, contemporary productivity, and colonial structures. 

Nomaduma Rosa Masilela and Thiago de Paula Souza invited artist collective HUNITI GOLDOX to participate in the residency FLOW / PRZEPŁYW for a week in July 2022. FLOW / PRZEPŁYW is a residency project by artists Agnieszka Brzeżańska and Ewa Ciepielewska that takes place on a boat. Artists are invited to flow along the currents of different rivers in Poland and Germany. For Vleeshal’s International Nomadic Program 2022-2023, Areej Huniti and Eliza Goldox were invited to float over the Polish river Wisła. During the residency, the four artists lived together on the boat and along the side of the river while they explored what it means to be at the mercy of the flow of a river as an artist and as a human being. The river is the starting point for a collective existence in which they are free to experiment without the need to produce work.

The entrance to On Water, Flow and Warped Time has been moved to the back of the former city hall, to pass underneath an existing relief of a ship and enhance the experience of time. The first work in the exhibition one comes across, lies in the courtyard outside. It is a boat that resembles the one that Brzeżańska and Ciepielewska use for their residency. A sail, specially produced for FLOW / PRZEPŁYW by Ciepielewska, will be attached to the pole of the boat. 

HUNITI GOLDOX presents the installation Measuring Time Through the Fall of Water by featuring a water clock whose sound resonates in the exhibition space. A water clock is an ancient system in which time is measured by the dripping of water. In their collaborative practice, HUNITI GOLDOX combines digital and natural elements while they play with ancient structures and automated systems that challenge you to reflect upon scientific and indigenous forms of knowledge and unmeasurable objects, subjects, and relations. 

Ewa Ciepielewska presents stories written during her travels on the river and sounds that are recorded along riverbeds. These can be read or listened to in a “sweat lodge” made of willows from Zeeland or in a large hammock, made of a fishing net. These works both reflect how we could potentially slow down in a fast-paced society by creating space for storytelling and introspection. 

The ceramics of Agnieszka Brzeżańska might remind you of mystical, godlike creatures that carry ancestral knowledge. These “ancestors” represent how our contemporary bodies respond to cultural perspectives and question what is nature and what is culture. Placed on platforms and in a fountain, the ancestors will be scattered around the space and serve as a guide throughout the exhibition. 

We invite visitors to wander through the space, to isolate themselves or meet others, to listen to stories, or lose themselves in the slow, meditative movements of a water clock. 

The exhibition concept was developed by Nomaduma Rosa Masilela and Thiago de Paula Souza, curators of Vleeshal’s International Nomadic Program 2022-2023 and handed over to Vleeshal’s team members Roeliena Aukema and Adriënne van der Werf, who took on the role of curators for this exhibition.