Exhibitions & events: Twarze/Faces. Katarzyna Kozyra & Katarzyna Szumska

Katarzyna Szumska (born in Szczecin in 1958) – a painter, stage designer, photographer and filmmaker. In 1983, she graduated from the Fine Art Academy in Gdansk, Department of Painting and Graphics, where studied under Prof. Jerzy Krechowicz.

In 1992, she co-founded the Cinema Theatre, an avant-garde formation operating on the border between visual arts and theater of movement in the village of Michałowice, in the Karkonosze Mountains. She is a laureate of the Jerzy Boniecki Polcul Foundation – Independent Foundation for the Promotion of Polish Culture, and has twice won scholarships from the Minister of Culture and National Heritage (in 2011 and 2014). Within them, she produced "Poczet Repatriantów Śląskich" (Silesian Repatriates) – a project about the inhabitants of Michałowice, their personal stories and the place where they live. It consists of interviews, photos, painted portraits and a pair of half-hour films summarizing both cycles of the project. In 2013, she received the City of Jelenia Góra Award for the exhibition "Portraits in Suspension" as the most interesting event of the year in the field of visual arts. From 2014 to 2017, she collaborated with Katarzyna Kozyra on her project "Looking for Jesus" (photos, videos, research work).

 

She lives and works in Michałowice, in a building that houses the Cinema Theatre and where many artistic projects and residences are realized.