PERFORMANCE AND EXHIBITION


Baltic Gallery of Contemporary Art
Centre for Creative Activities in Ustka
/ ul. Zaruskiego 1a
Sylwia Gorak
Witch Rises to Power by Singing
Curated by
Weronika Teplicka
Discipline /
performance, drawing
Period of stay / May – June 2024
Performance and exhibition
Creative Activity Center in Ustka
admission free
11.06.2024 / 5 p.m.
exhibition
9 a.m. – 5 p.m.
23 – 25.02.2024*
* admission to the gallery with ticket
Artist about the project
During my artist residency, I intend to research the acoustics of the Witch Tower in order to create a sound sculpture and vocal performance “Witch Rises to Power by Singing” (the title is a quote from an old practical magic textbook). As a professional singer, I have repeatedly experienced the beneficial effects of singing on the mental and physical wellbeing. In difficult and dramatic circumstances, singing becomes a therapeutic process allowing one to build a personal sense of power in life. Intense vocal work has developed in me some echolocation capabilities that allow me to navigate rooms without using the sense of sight. Blindfolded, I have been exploring the acoustics of galleries, old castles and churches for many years working internally with acoustics and the echolocation sense. During a performance, I find the most acoustic spots in a room or something like ‘power spots’. I mark them on the floor with white chalk and, seeing absolutely nothing, return to them several times guided only by the sounds and inner sensations.
Architecture is an auditory phenomenon in itself, enhancing the qualities of the human voice, singing and dialogue. It invisibly ‘organises’ our social life. Acoustics, reverberation effects, echoes, the natural amplification of sound or its disappearance are prominent properties of any architecture being a part of it.
When I think of the thousands of imprisoned and persecuted European women facing accusations of witchcraft, I identify psychologically with them at dramatic moments in their lives. Women in Poland, and especially in the Podkarpacie region where I come from, are still treated unjustly if they do not want to conform to the prevailing patriarchal social systems. For creative, unmarried and childless women, life in this part of Poland is quite difficult, as they are considered a suspicious antisocial element. In my early youth, while attending vocal workshops led by Professor Olga Szwajgier, I learnt to liberate my voice, to build with it inner power and self-esteem as a human being. I think that an imprisoned ‘witch’ could practice effective self-therapy with her voice. The residency will culminate in a vocal “concert” based on the phenomenon of Witch Tower acoustics and echolocation, and a series of charcoal drawings on paper depicting my personal para-magical practices. “Drawing down the Moon” will be a reflection on the phases of the moon reflected in the sea, in the context of a seascape. /Sylwia Gorak/.
Curator about the project
During her artistic residency at the Baltic Gallery of Contemporary Art and her work on the “Witch Rises Power by Singing” project, Sylwia Gorak began by tracing the herstory of the Witch Tower building, once a prison for women accused of witchcraft. Rather than searching for the reasons for their enslavement, the artist focused on the process of confinement and the possibility of developing ways to survive in crisis. Locked up in claustrophobic cells on death row, the women may have developed methods such as meditation or a particular way of singing that could put them in a state of lowered consciousness and reduced sensitivity to external stimuli.
In her artistic practice, Sylwia Gorak explores the properties of architecture with her own voice, while searching for the presence of acoustic points by means of echolocation. This phenomenon, which involves detecting obstacles by means of echoes and transforming the acoustic information they contain into a more accessible one, becomes the pivotal point of the artist’s performances. Based on navigating vocally in an enclosed area, when moving from a found acoustic point to a previously undefined destination, Gorak returns to the starting point by mapping the route of her movement. She covers her eyes in order to enhance her sense of hearing, and thus becomes more sensitive to other non-sensory means of analysing the properties of the structure of the buildings.
In addition to her performance at the Witch Tower, Sylwia Gorak will present a series of works entitled “Drawing Down the Moon”. In her work created with the use of the ‘free hand drawing’ technique, the artist evokes Japanese calligraphy.
Focusing on feeling and transferring previously memorised images onto paper, she looks at how nature and the female body function and how they synchronise and act according to the influence of the moon. She records its path of movement and its phases on a daily basis, for which she chooses an ideal vantage point – a seaside village free from light pollution.
Sylwia Gorak agrees with the claim that the first cave drawings found in Palaeolithic caves may have marked the origin of magic. She emphasises their peculiarity in that they were mostly created in caves with a high level of acoustic resonance. If the cave drawings were meant to evoke a certain anticipation and to tame reality, could singing and recording help to accept the “difficult” past of historical architecture? /Weronika Teplicka/
Sylwia Gorak
is a graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań, with a degree in Prof. Jerzy Kałucki’s painting studio and Prof. Jarosław Kozłowski’s performance studio. Holder of scholarships, including Prohealvetia in Switzerland, CECArtsLink in New York and Landeshauptstadt Kulturamt in Düsseldorf. Winner of the 5th Young Artists’ Biennale “Fish Eye”. Performer, vocalist. Exhibitions and concerts (including at Carnegie Hall New York). Creator of the World’s Largest Sundial (urban-art) in Düsseldorf. She is currently active in acoustic performance (she has a four-octave voice scale) and conceptual performance and is active in the international art circuit. She received a grant from the Susch Museum of the Grażyna Kulczyk Foundation. She co-created the international Common Ground project at the CCA in Toruń, as well as in Reykjavik and Vilnius. A pupil of Prof. Olga Szwajgier, a world-renowned opera singer.