The Penumbral Age
Art in the Time of Planetary Change

The Penumbral Age

The Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw invites to the exhibition “The Penumbral Age. Art in the Time of Planetary Change”, where we present artistic works from the last five decades, based on observations and visualizations of the changes underway on planet Earth. It provides a space for discussion on “managing the irreversible” and new forms of solidarity, empathy and togetherness in the face of the climate crisis.

We live in a time of planetary change affecting each and every one of us. Climate change influences every sphere of life, including thinking about art: the systems of its production and distribution, its social function and its relation to other disciplines, especially science. 

The title of the exhibition is drawn from the book The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway (2014), where the protagonists from the future date the “period of the penumbra” from the “shadow of anti-intellectualism that fell over the once-Enlightened techno-scientific nations of the Western world during the second half of the twentieth century, preventing them from acting on the scientific knowledge available at the time” and leading to tragedy. We are witnesses to this process: scientific findings have ceased to be regarded as dispositive and do not persuade people to act. As the American writer and historian Ibram X. Kendi wrote in The Atlantic, analysing scepticism about climate change or outright rejection of the threat (climate denialism): “Science becomes belief. Belief becomes science. Everything becomes nothing. Nothing becomes everything. All can believe and disbelieve all. We all can know everything and know nothing. Everyone lives as an expert on every subject.” 

Observations by artists are akin to those of scientists, but they typically do not confront viewers with an excess of numbers, soaring bar graphs, or “pornographic” images of poverty and devastation. Art has “strange tools” (Alva Noë, 2015) at its disposal, which we can use to discern “wonders in the heavens and signs on the earth.” When ordinary tools of dialogue and persuasion fail, artists enable an “imaginative leap” by working on the emotions, confronting the incomprehensible and the unknown. As the theoretician of visual culture Nicholas Mirzoeff puts it, we must “unsee” how the past “has taught us to see the world, and begin to imagine a different way to be with what used to be called nature.”

The “The Penumbral Age. Art in the Time of Planetary Change” spans five decades, and highlights the strengthening of environmental reflections in the art of the late 1960s and early 1970s as well as the second decade of the 21st century. The first period is linked with intensification of pacifist, feminist and anti-racist movements and the formation of the contemporary ecological movement. At the same time new artistic phenomena arose, such as conceptualism, anti-form, land art and earth art. While introducing “geological” thinking about art, artists used impermanent organic materials or sought to entirely dematerialize the work of art.

For us, land art is much more than a stream of Western art emblematic of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Following the thought of the Pakistani artist and activist Rasheed Araeen, drawing from his “ecoaesthetics” agenda, we seek “global art for a changing planet.” Actions connected with the “canonization” of land art, such as Richard Long’s Throwing a Stone around MacGillycuddy’s Reeks, in which the artist followed a stone he tossed before him, the “terraforming” plans of Robert Morris, or Gerry Schum’s television programme (an example of the use of new media to expose audiences to “organic” art practised in deserts or forests), are accompanied in this exhibition by works from the 21st century, employing ecological education (Futurefarmers, Ines Doujak, the Center for Land Use Interpretation), protest (Suzanne Husky, Akira Tsuboi), and involving spirituality and esoterics (Shana Moulton and Nick Hallett, Teresa Murak, Tatiana Czekalska, Leszek Golec).

Life in a state of deepening crisis forces us to fundamentally change our thinking about the entire system of social organization and to confront ethical and existential dilemmas (climate migrations and new class conflicts). The world of art, with its museums and rituals for organizing objects and ideas, is no exception (to paraphrase the slogan of the Youth Strike for Climate, “No museums on a dead planet!”) and requires deep systemic transformation. We treat engagement in this discussion as a duty of the museum, and not as just another fashion or stream in art. Countering the calls for “ecological restoration” or the popularity of “art of the Anthropocene,” we stress the permanence of environmental reflection, based on continuity and responsibility.

Art will certainly not protect us against catastrophe, but it can help us arm ourselves with “strange tools” for the work of imagination and empathy. In her memorable manifesto from 1969, Mierle Laderman Ukeles posed the question: “After the revolution, who’s going to pick up the garbage on Monday morning?” In works of art from recent decades we not only seek a visualization of processes occurring on our planet, but also discern possible proposals for the future. If ecological catastrophe is already happening (as the residents of the inundated islands of Nauru and Banaba in the Pacific would certainly agree), together we wonder, will we ever manage to clean up our planetary mess and rebuild our relations with other sentient beings? Will we manage to start over again?

Artists:

Jonathas de Andrade, Isabelle Andriessen, Rasheed Araeen, Robert Barry, Kasper Bosmans, Boyle Family, Agnieszka Brzeżańska, Dora Budor, Vija Celmins, Center for Land Use Interpretation, Alice Creischer, Czekalska + Golec, Betsy Damon, Tacita Dean, Thierry De Cordier, Agnes Denes, Ines Doujak, Jimmie Durham, Jerzy Fedorowicz, Hamish Fulton, Futurefarmers, Cyprien Gaillard, Simryn Gill, Wanda Gołkowska, Guerrilla Girls, Małgorzata Gurowska, Anna & Lawrence Halprin, Mitsutoshi Hanaga, Suzanne Husky, Ice Stupa Project, INTERPRT, Anja Kanngieser, Karrabing Film Collective, Beom Kim, Frans Krajcberg, Susanne Kriemann, Stefan Krygier, Katalin Ladik, Nicolás Lamas, John Latham, Richard Long, Antje Majewski, Nicholas Mangan, Krzysztof Maniak, Qavavau Manumie, Robert Morris, Shana Moulton & Nick Hallett, Teresa Murak, Peter Nadin & Natsuko Uchino & Aimée Toledano, Bruce Nauman, Nishiko, Isamu Noguchi, OHO, Dennis Oppenheim, Prabhakar Pachpute & Rupali Patil, Maria Pinińska-Bereś, Agnieszka Polska, Ludmiła Popiel, Joanna Rajkowska, Jerzy Rosołowicz, Oscar Santillán, Gerry Schum, Bonnie Ora Sherk, Anna Siekierska, Rudolf Sikora, Magdalena Starska, Irv Teibel, Akira Tsuboi, Maria Waśko, Ryszard Waśko, Lawrence Weiner, Magdalena Więcek, Andrea Zittel.

The exhibition was subsidezed by the Stiftung für deutsch-polnische Zusammenarbeit

Curators
Sebastian Cichocki, Jagna Lewandowska

Project management
Aleksandra Nasiorowska, Szymon Żydek

Exhibition architecture
Kooperative für Darstellungspolitik, Berlin

Key visual and graphic design of the exhibition
Jakub de Barbaro

Autorki i autorzy tekstów
Sebastian Cichocki, Jakub Depczyński, Jagna Lewandowska, Bogna Stefańska

Managing editor
Kacha Szaniawska

Translation
Klementyna Dec, Joanna Figiel, Agnieszka Modzelewska, Chris Smith, Piotr Urbaniak, Agnes Dudek

Promotion
Iga Winczakiewicz, Magdalena Zięba-Grodzka

Conservation and restoration
Joanna Dziewanowska-Stefańczyk, Michał Kożurno

Public program coodrinator
Paweł Nowożycki

Educational program
Paweł Brylski, Dominika Jagiełło, Marta Przasnek, Marta Przybył, Jolanta Woch i zespół edukacji „Użyj Muzeum”

Realization
Jakub Antosz, Marek Franczak, Piotr Frysztak, Szymon Ignatowicz, Jan Jurkiewicz, Aleksander Kalinowski, Yank Malikov, Grzegorz Ostromecki, Paweł Ostromecki, Paweł Sobczak, Marcin Szubiak, Michał Ziętek

Webdesign
Huncwot

Cooperation
Meagan Down, Joanna Kasperowska, Andrzej Kowalski, Hubert Kowalski, Agnieszka Kosela, Katarzyna Król, Anna Nagadowska, Dagmara Rykalska, Daniel Woźniak

See also:

Archive Events connected with the exhibition:

DzieńGodzinaNazwa wydarzeniaMiejsce wydarzenia
19:00 Online exhibition Premiere of the website of the exhibition“The Penumbral Age. Art in the Time of Planetary Change”
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
Online
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21:00 Concert Synergia DJ setonline
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
Online
,
12:00 Film screening Notes from a Cretaceous WorldNicholas Mangan's films screening
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
Online
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12:00 Opening Opening of the exhibition“The Penumbral Age. Art in the Time of Planetary Change”
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
14:00 Introduction Introduction to the exhibition in English“The Penumbral Age” MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
17:00 Introduction Introduction to the exhibition in Ukrainian“The Penumbral Age” MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
14:00 Guided tour Saturday guided tourin English MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
19:30 Film screening „The Happiest Thought”film screening
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
Copernicus Science Centre
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 20, Warsaw
14:00 Guided tour Guided tour in Ukrainian“The Penumbral Age” MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
14:00 Guided tour Saturday guided tourin English MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
12:00 Event „M E M B R A N E”Jacob Kirkegaard
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
19:00 Film screening „Kwassa Kwassa”SUPERFLEX
In cycle „The Penumbral Age”
MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw
14:00 Guided tour Saturday guided tourin English MUSEUM on the Vistula
Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie 22 (Skwer Kpt. S. Skibniewskiego "Cubryny"), Warsaw