In December 2019, I was one of five Irish artists (Jonathan Brennan, Joanna Mules, Marcus Patton and Katherine St Angelo - see below) invited to attend an international artist residence and exchange with three Polish counterparts in the historic city of Gdańsk.

The residency took place in Dom Aktora, a former actors’ residence in the old city, with over 30 years experience of organising artist exchanges. Professor Jacek Krenz (architect of the Monument to the Fallen Workers and the Cemetery of Lost Cemeteries), Professor Krzysztof Ludwin (Politechnika Krakowska), Anna Schumacher (Krakow) and Magdalena Nowacka (Katowice) formed the Polish contingent with whom we shared a living and working space for a week, creating new works of art inspired by Gdańsk and Sopot. All pieces were exhibited in a well-attended public exhibition at the close of the week.

Although Dom Aktora had organised similar exchanges with Armenia, Italy, etc. this was the first time that a Belfast-Gdansk exchange had taken place. The twinning of both cities in this way seemed right: we learned of our many commonalities, not least sharing a shipbuilding heritage and a troubled past, but also saw opportunities to learn from each other going forward e.g. Gdansk’s exemplary way of dealing with its recent history in the form of the Solidarity Museum vs. Belfast’s thriving, albeit underfunded, contemporary art scene.

Ireland

Jonathan Brennan - https://www.jonathanbrennanart.com

Joanna Mules - http://www.joannamules.com

Esther O’Kelly - https://estherokelly.com

Marcus Patton - https://www.bpw.org.uk/content/marcus-patton

Katherine St Angelo - http://www.katherinestangelo.com

Poland

Jacek Krenz - http://watermarks.weebly.com/ and http://www.pg.gda.pl/~jkrenz/index-gb.html

Krzysztof Ludwin - http://ludwin.pl

Magdalena Nowacka - https://nowackakolano.com

Anna Schumacher - http://www.annaschumacher-malarstwo.pl