ON Gallery – a guide

Magda Komborska, 2011-05-25

On January 3rd, 2012 the ON Gallery in Poznan closed, ending over 30 years of activity. Its closure was due to the financial difficulties of the University of Arts in Poznan which was its main sponsor. This important place on the artistic map, at 7 Fredry St. in Poznan is now a closed chapter of Polish art history. Magda Komborska – a member of a curatorial team of ON presents its idea and history since 1977.

Olgierd Nowak – the idea of a figure

In the seventies, a group of artists including Wojciech Wolynski, Wojciech Müller and Lech Dymarski, performed a series of happenings, whose hero was the mysterious Olgierd Nowak, who was in fact a non-existent figure, an archetype of "homo sovieticus", a model "officer" of socialist authority. Olgierd Nowak was everyone and no one at the same time. In the image of O.N. one could attribute his outline of many figures from public life, but it was difficult to tell, who he really resembles.

The first manager of the Gallery was Lech Dymarski, but through the first half year the function was fulfilled by Olgierd Nowak. The legend about Olgierd Nowak that survived from the communist times till now has changed its meaning, but something, however, remained.

The figure of Olgierd Nowak showed up in many anonymous actions and often even in the management of the Gallery which was not formally specified. It was the essence of the idea of the ON Gallery (since 1978) – keeping a certain kind of freedom in relation to the political system and keeping a non-profit profile. The Gallery was supposed to connect people who were slipping through the system, and in addition have creative ideas and initiate new creative technologies. It was to function as a laboratory, a house where one could meet, exchange ideas and experiences, and present the work of young artists. It was the only institution of this kind in Poland, that functioned at the Academy of Fine Arts and provided independent opportunities. The fact is that a different awareness of young, non-institutional mechanisms plus the financial situation of the University became a cause of its closing down and this is a sad conclusion.

Figures

Lech Dymarski organised a few exhibitions (first of which was by Wojciech Wolynski). However, because of political reasons he could not run the Gallery, therefore Krystyna Piotrowska became the new manager. In 1979 she was joined by Izabella Gustowska. Most often the Gallery was run by at least a duo, the only manager who ran the Gallery individually was Slawek Sobczak. It was run by in chronological order: Lech Dymarski 1977, Krystyna Piotrowska 1978-83, Izabella Gustowska 1979-94, Slawek Sobczak 1991-2002. After 2003 the Gallery changed its profile from artistic to curatorial. Since that time, it has been co-curated by Joanna Hofmann, Agata Michowska, Slawek Sobczak and Anna Tyczynska. Between 2007 and 2012 the Gallery was also run by Krzysztof Lukomski.

Genesis

The Gallery existed under communism, post-communism and survived the capitalist boom in the beginning of the 90s. It was a part of a structure of the authorities of the Academy of Fine Arts and under the auspices of the City. Its starting point was the OdNowa Club that existed since 1958 created by the Polish Students Union (Tadeusz Debski, Eugeniusz Mielcarek and Stanislaw Nawrotny).

The Club was situated at 1 Wielka St. #5. It was a place for social and cultural meetings. Initiatives that functioned there were: the Poznan Poetic Group Wierzbak, the Poetic-Musical Group Pro -Musica, the Club of Syncopic Music Lovers, the Students' Drama Theatre, The Theatre of the Triangular Stage and The Modern Swingers. There were also small individual exhibitions by Helena Michalowska (painting), Anna Krzymanska (sculpture), Jozef Kaliszan (sculpture), Jan Berdyszak (graphics), Eugeniusz Maldzis (graphics) and others. Apart from the exhibitions the OdNowa Club granted Artistic Awards by the Young to Jan Berdyszak and Jozef Kopczynski.

Around 1962 the initiative was taken over by the OdNowa Gallery that was active within the Club space and run by Andrzej Matuszewski, and soon after by the Debut Salon run by Jaroslaw Kozlowski (who was back then the assistant of Andrzej Matuszewski). The Salon and the OdNowa Gallery were closed in 1969. In 1970 an Agony Ball ended the activity of the Central Students' Club OdNowa at Wielka St., which was soon moved to the Caesar's Palace. This way, in 1977 the Gallery of Olgierd Nowak was born, in which there were three exhibitions: by Wojciech Wołyński, M. Yamamoto and Krystyna Piotrowska. Next year the ON Gallery (Olgierd Nowak's initials) was taken over by Krystyna Piotrowska. At the same time in the 70s and 80s in Poznan there was the Wielka 19 Gallery, Akumulatory 2, Maximal-Art and the Drawing Gallery (Galeria Rysunku).

New history, so what does the world need now?

The history of the ON Gallery can be divided into three periods: artists' gallery, curators' gallery and the open source gallery. Then the ON Gallery took a new direction. Rather than identifying with the place and its history, it decided to be an open space. Part of the Gallery’s manifesto’s from 2008 was an exhibition entitled "What the world needs now?" The new program did not mean a denial of the past, but rather tried to continue the anti-institutionalism, presenting creative individuals, keeping international contacts, anti-formalism, creating a curatorial group (which consisted of more and more people), the role of young curatorship and the discussion meetings organised by students from faculties that were not associated with art. The first activities of this type took place as part of the OBSCURATORS project by Krzysztof Lukomski and Agata Rogos (2008-2010), earlier the curators were Anna Tyczynska, Agata Michowska, Marek Wasilewski, Hubert Czerepok, Agnieszka Okrzeja and Sebastian Grzesiak.

In its final stage, the Gallery was divided into spaces such as: Open Studio [ON] (from 2010), Expo – an exhibition room and Cinema Room (where there were shows by the students' discussion group among others) and a part for a musicians' studio. The exhibition program was put together by a team: Magda Komborska, Zuzanna Koszuta, Jacek Zwierzynski and Natalia Pichlacz. The Gallery started to co-operate with the Tranzyt Foundation, started a residency program and a program called FRESH! (2011) – which was a co-operation with young Ethnologists and Culture Anthropologists from the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan. There were also vocal and film montage classes in the Gallery. It became an artist-run space in Poznan.

The ON Gallery in its broad function created a new model. From the so called gallery it became a place that opposed the idea of a regular place. ON broke with the universal white cube space and created an Expo form, that is changing the internal and external space, exhibitions outside of the gallery and directly for the public. This way it became closer to so called Exhibition design. It wanted to create a model for the presentation of artist, curator, idea, creativity, spectator and space as an unified project fixed in the memory of the inhabitants of the town by a plethora of events. The ON Gallery through its non-typical form of exhibitions became an inseparable part of Poznan city design.

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