How Warsaw Gallery Lokal_30 Flies the Flag for Polish Feminist Art
Portrait of Agnieszka Rayzacher and Kinga Cieplinska by Tatiana Vlasenko. Courtesy of Lokal_30.
Installation view of “Tender Debauchery” at Lokal_30, 2023. Courtesy of Lokal_30.
Lokal_30 is a gallery and exhibition space in Warsaw’s trendiest neighborhood, Śródmieście Południowe. The gallery is dedicated to showcasing the work of women and queer artists, and was founded by Polish curator and art critic Agnieszka Rayzacher nearly two decades ago. Here are five things to know about this tastemaking gallery.
1. Lokal_30’s mission is to carve out a space for feminism in the Polish art world
Maria Anto, Odwrócone lustro (Mirror Turned), 1974. Courtesy of the artist and Lokal_30.
Since 2005, Agnieszka Rayzacher of Lokal_30 has been working with women artists in Poland to realize an ambitious exhibition program in Warsaw. The gallery’s current show, “Tender Debauchery,” which opened this month, accompanies the second edition of the Post Pxrn Film Festival taking place in the city, and is showing the work of 25 women and queer artists across photography, sculpture, painting, and performance.
Rayzacher is not only passionate about supporting young, emerging artists in Poland like Justyna Górowska and Liliana Zeic, but also those who have produced work in Poland since the 1960s, such as Natalia LL, Ewa Zarzycka, and Maria Anto. “We first opened the gallery 16 years after the fall of communism in Poland, and at this point we saw the importance of working with artists of older generations,” Rayzacher explained. “Working with artist archives and estates was something new in commercial galleries in Poland in the mid-2000s, but this continues to be an essential part of maintaining feminist histories of art.”
2. The gallery is located in an old tenement house in Warsaw
Exterior view of Lokal_30, with Paweł Żukowski, Wierzę Ci, Zuzanno (I Believe You, Zuzanna), 2022. Photo by Adam Gut. Courtesy of Lokal_30.
As the only gallery in Warsaw dedicated solely to supporting feminist art and exhibition-making, Lokal_30 is a home for women and queer artists in Poland. The gallery’s location in a repurposed domestic space only sets to underscore this notion.
Rayzacher originally founded Lokal_30 alongside the artist Zuznna Janin as a curatorial project in Janin’s studio, which was an old tenement house in the Polish capital. Though the gallery is now located in a much larger space in the Śródmieście Południowe area of Warsaw, it has stayed true to its beginnings, and is situated in a tenement house with four large rooms.
Artworks spill across every nook of the space, with installations even appearing in its bathroom, where Aga Szreder and Rafal Żwirek’s polaroid photography project Privilege (2022) is currently on display as part of the “Tender Debauchery” exhibition.
3. Artist publications are as important as exhibitions for the gallery
Lokal_30 has collaborated with important domestic institutions such as CCA Łaźnia, Galeria Miejska Arsenał, and the Zachęta National Gallery of Art to produce publications on Polish artists across generations, including Anna Orbaczewska, Maria Anto, Zuzanna Janin, and Ewa Zarkzycka.
“One of the main outputs of Lokal_30 is our book publications,” Rayzacher told Artsy. Pointing out the small library positioned in a corner of the gallery, Rayzacher continued, “Our publications are mostly monographs of understudied artists whose work urgently requires critical attention.”
Publications, as much as exhibitions, are fundamental to the feminist politics of Lokal_30 where Rayzacher aims to ensure such artists are not forgotten from history. “We have recently begun to collaborate with Joanna Rajkowska, one of the most important and internationally renowned Polish artists of my generation,” Rayzacher explained. “Although some writing on her work exists, shockingly she doesn’t have a typical artist monograph published. We are starting talks with institutions about a joint publication. I see it as my mission to fill these gaps in the literature.”
4..Photography, video, and performance art are key at Lokal_30
Liliana Zeic, hugs and kisses 5, 2023. Courtesy of the artist and Lokal_30.
Justyna Gorowska and Tadeusz Rolke, Corposhiva, 2017-18. Courtesy of the artists and Lokal_30.
Spanning photography, film, sculpture, installation, performance, and painting, what unites the artists of Lokal_30 is their exploration of gender and sexuality. “Photography and film were very important for women artists working in the 1960s and ’70s who were investigating the body, and registering emotion and affect in their artwork in new ways,” said Rayzacher.
In September, Lokal_30 will open its “Zoom” exhibition for Warsaw Gallery Weekend, bringing together works by two experimental Polish photographers, Jolanta Marcolla and Isabella Gustowska, who were prolific during the 1970s.
The critical art movement in Poland from the 1990s is another key point of context for the artists that Lokal_30 works with. Reflected in the work of contemporary artists like Liliana Zeic, critical artists in Poland used the body as a site to investigate power structures and subjectivity. Rayzacher is particularly excited about Zeic, a queer feminist artist and activist whose work encompasses photography, film, and performance. The artist will be exhibiting her work in a solo show with Lokal_30 at the end of 2023.
5. The gallery’s ambition is to create a network of support for women artists and collectors in Poland
“More than just selling artworks, Lokal_30 creates a space for women collectors and artists in Poland to support one another,” Rayzacher told Artsy. “It’s important that we support artists through our ambitious exhibition program that our collectors are excited about.”
Beyond the walls of the gallery, Lokal_30 facilitates the ongoing series of events named the Feminist Seminar (SemFem), where the main objective is “to put feminism into practice, perceived not only from an ideological and emancipatory perspective but also as practicing empathy, solidarity, caring, and building a community.” This ethos seamlessly moves between the seminar space and gallery.
“More and more women are collecting art in Poland and most of the collectors I work with are now women. At Lokal_30, artists and collectors have the opportunity to share space together, have conversations and be understood,” Rayzacher added. “I’m doing what I’m doing with artists because women collectors are supporting me. Together we are building a support system.”
