The night of October 22-23, 2019, the bodies of 39 Vietnamese migrants were found in a truck near London. On July 24 of the same year, “Gazeta Polska” attaches stickers to a new issue with the slogan “LGBT-free zone.” July 14, 2016, an attacker drives a truck onto a promenade in Nice and kills 87 people. July 24, 2019, far-right groups attack participants in the Equality March in Bialystok. May 25, 2020, in Minneapolis, a police officer strangles African-American George Floyd during an arrest. October 20, 2020, the nationwide Women’s Strike begins….
The list of events that have stopped time in recent years, have a dramatic dimension, is very long. Where is justice, where are the Eries, the goddesses of vengeance, punishment? Do we become indifferent to them? Is it possible to compare one death to another? Are we complicit as a society? Among other things, the photographer, author of multimedia art projects Szymon Kobusinski tries to answer these questions in his latest series of photographs and installations “Erynie”.

Wojciech Przylipiak
Journalist

Szymon Kobusinski boldly confronts modernity. He creates visually sophisticated compositions that force viewers to confront the problems surrounding us today. However, the subjective review of events takes on a universal meaning and will not lose its relevance. What’s more, Kobusinski does not operate on facts and history alone – the artist primarily focuses on the thoughtful language of plastic expression. The works in the square, seemingly static, attack us with blood red, strong contrasts, disturbing bursts of blue or bold diagonals. Kobusinski’s underwater world fascinates, frightens and moves us. It’s been a long time since any photographic exhibition made such a strong impression on me.

dr. weronika Kobylińska
Institute of Art History, University of Warsaw

(…) Out of powerlessness, the question of justice is finally born. A question about where Alecto, Tisiphone and Megayra have gone today. About where the erinas – goddesses of vengeance for all iniquity – have gone. The question of erinas is also the main theme of Szymon Kobusinski’s exhibition. Referring to the most tragic examples of intolerance in the 21st century, the artist tries to arrange his own worldview along a timeline stretching from September 11, 2001 to the Independence March on November 11, 2020. – My Eries is a kind of examination of conscience. An exploration of where I am today. Of how I look at the modern world. In all the running around where I am attacked with millions of pieces of information, I would like to catch a perspective and look at everything in my own way. That’s why, as an artist, I needed a topic like this to work through. I don’t have the need to be a missionary and repair it, because I think that would just be naive. I want to start with myself. To put my own backyard in order. I – Szymon Kobusinski – want to work on Szymon Kobusinski,” emphasizes the author of the exhibition.(…)

With each of these topics I go to sleep and with each of them I wake up.The topic of the 2005 London subway explosions is close to me for family reasons.My sister was living in London at the time. I was driving through Warsaw by car somehow from the direction of Żoliborz.I was under the Poniatowski Bridge when information was given about some kind of phone malfunction in London and the fact that the subway had stopped.I then felt that something bad had happened and called my sister.Of course, I couldn’t reach her.The company where she worked was right in the center of London.Luckily she was late for the subway.The police blocked her passage, causing her to get stuck in some store.She was terrified.I couldn’t contact her for hours.Then I watched the 5 p.m. Telexpress and saw train cars torn apart by bombs, terrified people, and a voice rang out in my head that somewhere out there was my sister,” Kobusinski recalled.(…)

Kamil Rakosza
Journalist

ERYN by Szymon Kobusinski. You must see it and feel it. You will only meet the Truth about your sensitivity there. I am quite an emotional person but I don’t usually cry at exhibitions. This exhibition moved me to tears. I don’t know what I was crying over…. over the world, or over myself, or maybe over how much good we need to create every day to be able to live the life we want? How difficult it seems! I felt a great longing for something that has always been in my heart, for the good that I still lack. I felt a great sadness that accompanies any suffering of mine or someone else’s. I felt uncertainty and embarrassment when the question arose in me whether I always knew how to feel and act appropriately for the situation, I felt how immensely difficult it is to weigh within myself the decision of what is Truth if we are not really in touch with what we feel and with what we want to feel. I felt moved and in awe of the beautifully told story, because how the author tells about his works is an equal part of this exhibition. Here you will meet your Truth and the Truth of us all. Eries is a Testimony of our sensitivity. For me, it is a beautiful lesson in emotionality and a deep understanding that without individual Emotional Awareness, it will be difficult for us to create a beautiful world. And it is high time that we start acting every day for the common Good. It is imperative to do this homework! Do we know how to feel ourselves enough to feel safe and create a beautiful future together? “How about, let go of our views? In the name of happiness, set our hearts in motion?”

Malgorzata Marczewska
Art Coach