Lublin is a significant place for the history of Polish performance art. The artists today considered the classics performed here at a time when performance was still budding. Galeria Labirynt has been a particularly important place, where in 1978 an international festival ‘Performance and Body’ took place, remaining our point of reference until today.
The first edition of Performance Platform Lublin was held in 2009 on the initiative of Waldemar Tatarczuk, who still has a major influence on the shape of each edition. Since 2011, the festival has been organised by Performance Art Foundation established in Lublin, conducted by a small group of artists, art historians and curators, for whom performance is a vital field of the newest art. The artists we have invited so far have been somewhat experienced ones, both the classics, such as Nigel Rolfe, Zbigniew Warpechowski, Alastair MacLennan or Janusz Bałdyga, and the emerging ones from all over the world, who have been selected in an open competition.
A lot has changed since the times of the first performances which were held here in the 1st half of the ‘70s. What is performance today? We do not know the answer to this question, but as far as our modest possibilities allow, we attempt to present artists who turn to performance, drawing on what is classical in it, but also broadening its boundaries. Performance Platform Lublin points to performance as a thriving phenomenon originating from the inner need for creating beyond the rigid division into the media, a resultant of reality and the inner world. It also points to the variety of thinking about ephemeral art, strategies for action and attitudes, dialogue with other arts, everyday life and other people. Above all, it is a meeting of artists and viewers, as far as in the case of performance this division can be even concerned.
In November Galeria Labirynt in Lublin will have immense pleasure to welcome everybody to three days of presentations by the participants of the workshops conducted by Marilyn Arsem, Jürgen Fritz and Martin Zet, screenings of performance documentation submitted by artists from all over the world and discussions with the viewers. A Lublin-based theme will also be included. The festival schedule is to be announced in October, after the list of participants will have been published.
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