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Lacemakers from FundĂŁo
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Thoughts 32
For those who know
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Gate to Everything
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Scars 178
Tableware for Pigeons
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Happy Hour 188
Entanglement 50
Guanxi 190
Oak Beach 54
Studies 200
Epitaph for the forest
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Imagine a World Without Water
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House of Mr. Sajid
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The Big Picture
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West Bank Wall
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Walls of Bologna
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Happy New Year!
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Precariat 278
Sterntaler 84
Fukushima 286
Scrabble
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Bowling in Belorado
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Pople Talking 362
Muse of Street Art
The Samllest Pope in the World
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I was born in 2009. Lace soon became my signature style. Why Lace? Because each lace harbours harmony, balance and a sense of natural order. Isn’t that just what we are all searching for?
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Warsaw / Poland / 2010
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Warsaw / Poland
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Each petal takes about a minute of my time to form. I aim to make 50 kg of petals every year. Visitors to the gallery where my works are presented, can, in a sense, feel and hear my thoughts by touching, holding and turning the petals in their fingers while producing distinct sounds.
CiS BWA Gallery / Wrocław / Poland / 2015
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THE GATE TO EVERYTHING A project for European Capital of Culture 2016 Wrocław / Poland / 2015
My work here was part of an artistic revitalisation on a run down and ‚difficult’ area. I wanted to convince the people passing the gate (through the tunnel) to think about what they hoped for most. At the entrance the stratigically placed caption reads ‚What are you dreaming about?’. If only the intention of a passer-by is pure, then the installation will help satisfy the dream. Maybe not right away, and not for certain, but I feel strongly the probability is very high.
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TABLEWARE FOR PIGEONS Warsaw / Poland / 2014
At one of the main junctions in Warsaw’s city centre, close to the Central Railway Station, there is a spot that attracts flocks of pigeons. Every day locals put grain there and during the summer there are water bowls. Grain is strewn over the ground and the bowls are always old and dirty. It crossed my mind that pigeons deserved better tableware.
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The Cave
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EPITAPH FOR THE FOREST Białowieşa - Warsaw / Poland / 2016-2017 Many thanks to Greenpeace Poland and Dzika Polska Foundation for the support.
Bialowieza Forest has a unique ecosystem. It is the last European lowland natural forest, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a home to the last wild aurochs. Despite protests by ecologists, state owned wood companies are constantly increasing the timber extraction in the protected forest areas. This they do under the pretext of fighting beetle infestations. According to scientists and ecologists, this unique ecosystem will soon be destroyed and replaced with an industrial style of planting. In the endangered areas of the wood I made a collection of bark prints. The ceramic plaques are a posthumous mask in memory of the forest that has gone forever.
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Mumbai / India / 2011
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SCRABBLE
Art Boom Festival / Krakow / Poland / 2011
At this time the concept of post-truth wasn’t yet in common use and ‚alternative facts’ were only an oxymoron. The project is meant to encourage one to search for information independently. Also to verify sources connected to ongoing issues such as military conflicts, GMO, global health politics, the origin of financial crises, nature and corporation strategies, global warming or Energy giants.
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I summarised the the project with a series of posters.
World Without Water
The Shock Doctrine
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The Corporation
The Union
The World According to Monsanto
Money as Debt
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Warsaw / Poland / 2012
During the painting of these large laces in Warsaw, I was approached twice by the Police. On the first occasion I asked them if I could finish my work while they were checking my identity. I had just painted three-quarters of the second circle, they could see the obvious gap in the pattern, and allowed me to continue. As the sun set and I packed up, the policemen confirmed I could go, but warned me I would be summoned to the court for the costs of damage I caused. I responded by telling them I would be
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back tomorrow to complete my work, so they were more than welcome to record me again. I don’t think they took me seriously. The following day, while I was completing the fourth circle, the policemen returned. I think they were bemused. The friendlier of the two, who smiled more, told me „We’ll stay here for some time so nobody harasses you. You’ve got one hour”. A court summons never reached me.
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Warsaw / Poland / 2012
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Intralci Festival / Franciacorta / Italy / 2012
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Lacemakers from Pรณvoa da Atalaia Pรณvoa da Atalaia / Portugal / 2017
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Wool Festival / FundĂŁo / Portugal / 2014
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Vienna / Austria / 2014
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HAPPY HOUR QRE Festival / Hong Kong / 2015
The title of the piece was obvious to me because of a huge caption saying ‚Happy Hour’ on an advert just above the spot where I was painting. Hong Kong is the most dynamic city I’ve had a chance to work in. From dawn to dusk, life runs at mesmerising speed. For the first time, while working outdoors, nobody stopped to ask what I was doing. It was not for lack of curisosity, the passers-by did slow down to take a photo with their cell phones but before they could open their mouths to speak they were being swept along by the crowds.
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During this time I met a girl working in an advertising agency. She confided in me that her last free day was three months ago, and that it was also the last time she had seen her boyfriend! In that moment I thought, to live in Hong Kong, that rare opportunity to induldge in some rest must really be considered as the ‚happy hour’.
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Perth / Australia / 2015
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206: Urban Art Esch / Esch-sur-Alzette / Luxembourg / 2015 207: Warsaw / Poland / 2014
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232: San Potito Sannitico / Italy / 2015 233: Bolsena / Italy / 2015
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THE BIG PICTURE Point of view - group site specific exhibition Parco de Pena / Sintra / Portugal / 2016
At first sight Parc of Pena, the natural treasure of Portugal, appears to be a mysterious labyrinth of overlapping and intertwined avenues, paths and stairs, all of which can seem completely chaotic. But several hundred hectares of green madness were designed with a watchmaker’s precision; there is nothing random here.
Over several days I watched tourists visiting the park. It became obvious to me that most of them was struggling to get from their point A to point B. They stood still, pointed, shook heads and dithered between information on their paper maps or apps on their smartphones while occasionally looking up at the road signs. The tourist’s actions made me think of how an ant would scurry aimlessly all over a doily. The ant doesn’t know the precise symmetry of the pattern it is running on. What it sees in front of it are just entangled threads. To see the beauty of the pattern, the ant would have to change its point of view, look at the pattern from a distance. Only then would its eyes see the big picture and the organised symmetry. I believe the Park of Pena gives one the opportunity for an experience different from following a map. One doesn’t have to find paths, one should let oneself get lost and maybe after some time is spent rambling one will find a new, wider perspective.
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Dni Koronki Koniakowskiej / Koniakรณw / Poland / 2016
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Pont-l’Abbé / France / 2016
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Zielony plac Defilad / Warsaw / Poland / 2016
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Bombarral / Portugal / 2017
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UpNorth Festival / Røst - Lofoten / Norway / 2017
Pietro Querini was a 15th-century Captain from Venice. His vessel was shipwrecked in Lofoten, in northern Norway, in the winter of 1432. The storm ravaged the ship and only 11 of the 68 crew members survived. They were found by local fishermen, after nearly a month on the desert island. This dramatic incident was the origin of trade between northern Norway and Italy, and subsequently the combination of Norwegian stockfish and Italian cooking (baccalà) became possible. The history of European laces also started in the15th century in Venice. During the next century it was there that the first known lace pattern books were printed (Le Pompe in the 1550’s). In Lofoten I used a pattern taken from the first Venetian handbook. I thought maybe, just maybe Captain Querini might have dressed himself in an outfit with such a lace trim.
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One Wall by Urban Nation Berlin / Germany / 2017
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Musée des Beaux-arts et de la Dentelle Alençon / France / 2018
Alençon lace, known as “the Queen of laces and a lace for Queens“, is the most elaborate needle-point lace ever produced in France. It traces its origins to 1665, when Louis XIV determined to improve the quality of French lace in order to keep in the country the enormous sums then being spent on Italian and Flemish laces by members of his court. Brigitte Lefebvre
UNESCO recognised the exceptional quality of Alençon lace by adding it to the “Representative List of the Cultural Heritage of Humanity“. In the early 1980s, in Atelier National du Point d’Alençon, a lace maker Brigitte Lefebvre created a new lace pattern ‚Reason Baroque’. The pattern was based on earlier drawings of another lace maker, Théresé Lemoine. I chose this motif to paint a mural on the historic building of the Museum of Fine Arts and Lace in Alençon.
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Monumenta - group exhibition / Leipzig / Germany / 2018 International Contemporary Art Exhibition / Yerevan / Armenia / 2018 SkarĹźysko Kamienna / Poland / 2018
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BOWLING IN BELORADO Belorado / Spain / 2019
I was invited to Belorado in Spain to a project that addresses the presence of women in public space. In this region of Spain, a popular game practiced only by women for hundreds of years is the local type of bowling. The project aimed to restore this tradition. Together with Spanish artist Regue Fernåndez, we painted all the Plaza San Nicolas frontages. This square was a place where local women played bowling. I found and painted local lace motifs and Regue the figures of local women, based on old photos from the city’s chronicle. Many people came to the opening of the square in the new decor. There was a lot of joy, laughter and fun. Perhaps some of the older ladies playing bowling again are girls from black and white photos that Regue painted around...
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Lodhi Art Festival / New Delhi / India / 2019
On the occasion of International Womens Day 2019 I was invited to Delhi to paint a mural inspired by the traditional women led crafts, connecting the European lace patterns and the Indian rangoli patterns. The final work was also a result of a workshop with 25 women from Nizamuddin area, the medieval Islamic district in Delhi. My original pick for this mural was brown, but when I started painting it brown, i realised something was amiss here. It didn’t look like that the mural belonged to the people who live in Lodhi Colony. When I looked around, there was so much colour everywhere — trees, women wearing clothes in shades of red, red bindis.., And here my work was looking dull, not matching with the vibrancy around. So I picked red, and I’d say, women of Lodhi Art District are the inspiration behind the wmural.
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Farm Cultural Park / Favara / Sicily - Italy / 2019
The wall on which I painted in Favara was in very poor condition and painting the mural was a real challenge. The building was old and abandoned, but here the local organization, Farm Cultural Park, was soon preparing the first edition of the Countless Cities Biennial, a large international artistic event. I used a motif taken from the tablecloth belonging to a local woman living nearby.
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During my stay in Favara I made also a stencil based on another local lace and painted it in many places around the city.
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Le Locle / Switzerland / 2019
Le Locle is a beautiful small town in Switzerland, which today is the seat of global watch brands such as Tissot, Zenith, Ulisse Nardin or Mont Blanc. However, in the 19th century the city was known for its beautiful lace, there were over 600 lace-makers working in the town. I met with the last of them to commemorate their heritage. The project was realized during my artistic residency at the Luxor Factory in Le Locle.
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Re:Think Sisak Festival / Sisak / Croatia / 2019
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Museum of Louvre / Lens / France / 2019
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PEOPLE TALKING „Mankind’s greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn’t have to be like this. Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future. (...) All we need to do is make sure we keep talking.” Stephen Hawking “An enemy is someone whose story you have not heard.” Slavoj Žižek „The Lord said: The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them! Come, let Us go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.” Genesis 11:6, 11:7
I believe we should talk more. Directly, faceto-face. Remaining constantly online we are being swamped with news from the media, social networks, newsletters, emails, messengers. Overwhelmed by the information we lose the ability to read lengthy texts, to reflect on them. We only see leads, headlines, keywords. Nuances are lost, the world becomes black and white. Facebook and Twitter are great, but someone once said they were designed only to prevent any rational discussion. We enclose ourselves in filter bubbles, we block and delete those who do not share our views. Not knowing and not understanding diversity, we become a mass that can be easily controlled, antagonized and set against the others. Soon „the others” become strangers, and strangers become enemies... 358
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EXHIBITIONS AND EVENTS
2019 • Museum of Louvre - Lens. Lens, France. Installation + live painting. • Musée des Beaux-arts . Alençon, France. Lighting object. • F(r)iction, group show. Lhodi Art District, New Delhi, India. Installation. • St+Art Festival, New Delhi, India. Mural. • Bobowa, Poland. A mural on the building of the City Hall. • Countless Cities Biennial. Favara, Sicily/Italy. Mural + installation. • [Re]Think Sisak Festival. Sisak, Croatia. Mural. • Madrid Street Art Project. Madrid, Spain. Mural. • Luxor Factory Art Residency. Le Locle, Switzerland. Mural. • StARTer Proyectos Culturales. Belorado, Spain. Mural. • Urban Nation Biennial. Berlin, Germany. Installation. • Le Mur. Rennes, France. Mural. 2018 • International Contemporary Art Exhibition 2018 (ICAE2018). HayArt Cultural Center, Yerevan, Armenia. Installation. • Monumenta. Leipzig, Germany. Group exhibition. • Urban Nation Art Residency, Berlin, Germany. Installation. • Milion Możliwosci. Łaźnia Gallery, Radom, Poland. Group exhibition. • Ziomki & Przyjaciele. O29 Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. Group exhibition. • Emergence Festival, Valverde, Italy. Mural. • Culture center in Skarżysko-Kamienna, Poland. Installation. • Forum kolektyw, Gdańsk, Poland. Mural. • Musée des Beaux-arts, Alençone, France. Mural. • Kristiansand, Norway. Mural. • Facebook office, Warsaw, Poland. Mural. • Instytut Festival, Modlin, Poland. Installation. • Helsinki Urban Art Festival, Helsinki, Finland. Installation. • Warsztaty Kultury, Poland, Lublin. Mural. • Muzeum Częstochowskie, Częstochowa, Poland. Installation.
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2017 • There’s no limit. Group exhibition curated by Thinkspace Gallery (LA). Borås, Sweden • Style Madness. Group exhibition. Lublin, Poland. • Lacemakers from Póvoa da Atalaia, a mural. Póvoa da Atalaia, Portugal. • Civita Strret Fest, Civitacampomarano, Italy. Mural. • Cathedral, instalation. Vila do Conde, Portugal. • No Limit Festival, Borås, Sweden. Mural. • Up North Festival, Røst, Lofoten, Norway. Mural. • One Wall by Urban Nation, Berlin, Germany. Mural. • Poliniza Dos Festival, Valencia, Spain. Mural. • Forum Kolektyw, Gdańsk, Poland. Installation. • Fukushima, installation. Chernobyling Festival, Prypyat, Ukraine. • IBUG, Chemnitz, Germany. Stencil graffiti. • Bombarral, Portugal. Mural • Epitaph for the forest, installation. Warsaw, Poland. • Festiwal czterech kultur, Łódź, Poland. Installation. 2016 • Harmony. Walls of Bologna. Solo exhibition, Porta Nova Gallery, Bologna, Italy. • Precariat. Bronze statue, II Street Art Biennale, Moscow, Russia. • The big picture. Lace installation. Point of viev - group exhibition, Sinta, Portugal. • Remuera Festival, Auckland, New Zealand. Mural. • Dunedin Street Art, Dunedin, New Zealand. Mural. • Zielony Plac Defilad, Warsaw, Poland. Horizontal mural. • Pont-l’Abbé, France. Mural and lace installation. • Koniaków, Poland. Mural. • Estau Arte Urbana, Estarreja, Portugal. Mural. • Limerick, Ireland. Lace installation. • Emergence Festival, Giardini Naxos, Sicily, Italy. Mural. 2015 • Blizny / Scars. Solo exhibition, BWA Gallery, Wrocław, Poland. • Tableware for Pigoens. Solo exhibition, Taito Gallery, Helsinki, Finland. • Recrafted. Form Gallery, Perth, Australia. Exhibition with Nandita Kumar • Bez Różu, Arsenał Gallery, Poznań, Poland. Group exhibition. • Guanxi. Mural. Form Festival, Perth, Australia. • Happy hour. Mural. Guanxi. Installation. QRE Festival, Hong Kong. • Ladybirds. Tbilisi, Georgia. A mural for children. • A gate to everything. Light & painting installation, commisioned by ESK2016 Wrocław, Poland
2012 • A mural commisioned for Starak Foundation, Warsaw, Poland. • Urban Art Esch, Luxemburg. Mural. • Street Art Festival, Bielsko Biała, Poland. Mural. • Forty-Forty Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. Mural. • Fate Festival, San Potito Sannitico, Italy. Mural. • Festiwal Koronki Klockowej, Bobowa, Poland. Mural. • Biennale Bolsena Ricama, Bolsena, Italy. Mural. • Ex-Voo Festival , Dree, Francja. Lace installation • WRSW / BRLN. An installation with Aida Gomez. Warsaw, Poland • Szpargaty, Poznań, Poland. Mural. • Festival Halasi Csipke, Kiskunhalas, Hungary. Mural. 2014 • Merlettis. Solo exhibition. Elastico Gallery, Bologna, Italy. • Beef. Video installation. Pies czy Suka Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. • Tableware for Pigeons. Video installation. 19x19 Gallery, Group exhibition, Warsaw, Poland. • Big Draw Festival, Nijmegen, Holand. Stencil graffiti. • HX Festival, Helsingborg, Sweden. Insatllation. • Djerbahood, Djerba/Tunisia. Mural, ceramic. • Fundao, Portugal. Installation, mural, cramic • Installation for 40th anniversary of Polish Institute, Vienna, Austria. 2013 • Szelest myśli. Solo exhibition.BWA Gallery, Olsztyn, Poland. • Cash, Cans & Candy. Group exhibition. Ernst Hilger Gallery, Vienna, Austria. • Punkt bez ja. Group exhibition. Galeria Arsenał/ Elektrownia, Białystok, Poland. • 19x19 Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. Group exibition. Installation. • Boombastic Urban Art Festival, Vodnjan, Croatia. Mural, ceramic. • Walk&Talk. Public Art Festival, Azores, Portugal. Mural. • The smallest pope in the world. Sculpture. ART.eria Festival. Częstochowa, Poland. • Turnpike Grup, London. Mural. • Bolsena Biennale l’Arte nel Ricamo e nel Merletto, Bolsena, Italy. Mural, installations.
• Koronkowa robota. Group exhibition. Zamek Cieszyn Gallery, Cieszyn, Poland. • Bunker Festival, Turin, Italy. Mural, Installation. • Traffic Design Festival, Gdynia, Poland. Mural • Skrzyżowanie Kultur Festival, Białystok, Poland. Mural, installation. • Artaq End Show, Paris, France. Group exhibition. • Rempex Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. Group exhibition. • Cały ten street art. Galeria Nova, Kraków. Group exhibition. 2011 • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Intralci. Milano, Italy. Group exhibition. No Women No Art Festival, Poznań, Poland. Insatllation. Fame Festival, Grottaglie, Italy, Murals, ceramic. Gallery for Tibet, Warszawa. Poland. Group exhibition. Graffiti vs Street Art. Zachęta Gallery, Lublin, Poland. Group exhibition. Etnoinspiracje. National Gallery, Gdańsk, Poland. Group exhibition. Scrabble. Art Boom Festival, Kraków, Poland. Ogrody Tymczasowe Festival, Kraków, Poland. Installation. Artaq End Show, Angers, Paris, Berlin, France/Germany. Street Art Festival, Katowice, Poland. Miasto dziergane. Spot Gallery, Poznań, Poland. Group exhibition. Polski Street Art, Centre of Contemporary Art, Warsaw, Poland. Group exhibition. Pless Art Festival, Pszczyna,Poland. Ceramics.
2010 • Street Art w Królikarni. National Gallery, Warsaw, Poland. Group exhibition. • Festival of Visual Arts, Brzeszcze, Poland. Mural. 2009 • I was born in Warsaw, Poland.
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