The exhibition of works from the MOCAK Collection at the MAXXI National Museum of 21st Century Arts in Rome will take place at the end of 2016 and the beginning of 2017. This will be the first such large‑scale and comprehensive presentation of works from the collection of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Cracow, MOCAK, to be presented in Italy. We will be presenting over 50 works including paintings, photographs, video, installations, and objects. The MOCAK Collection was first presented outside Poland at the exhibition Art Is Freedom which was shown at the Palace of Art in Lviv in 2014. The selection included a few dozen video works and photographs of Polish and international artists.

The exhibition organized by the MOCAK, and coproduced with MAXXI will be an opportunity to become acquainted with the canon of Polish contemporary art represented by artists such as: Paweł Althamer, Krzysztof M. Bednarski, Rafał Bujnowski, Andrzej Dłużniewski, Edward Dwurnik, Tomasz Ciecierski, Katarzyna Górna, Zbigniew Libera, Marcin Maciejowski, Bartek Materka, Józef Robakowski, Wilhelm Sasnal, Jadwiga Sawicka and Krzysztof Wodiczko. The presentation will also include international artists and artistic groups such as: AES+F, Reza Aramesh, Josef Dabernig, Maya Gold, Sarah Lucas, Shahar Marcus, Muntean/Rosenblum, Shinji Ogawa and Daniel Spoerri.

The MOCAK Collection comprises 4 557 works by 235 artists from 32 countries. It is MOCAK’s aim to persuade those not professionally connected with art that art is an indispensable tool for understanding the world. We want to fight the fallacy that art should be pleasing and decorative. One of the Museum’s main tasks is the promotion of friendship between art and audiences. The Collection is an important tool in this process. From its very beginning, it has been one of MOCAK’s underlying principles to juxtapose Polish and international art in order to demonstrate that the former is part of the latter and that it shares its prevailing values. The exhibition in Rome will demonstrate this par excellence.

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow, MOCAK, was officially inaugurated on 19 May 2011. MOCAK is the first museum in Poland to have been purpose-built from scratch with the aim of presenting contemporary art. The building was set up on the site of the former Oskar Schindler  factory in the post-industrial district of Zabłocie, which, in recent years, has undergone regeneration. The museum building was designed by the architectural studio Claudio Nardi Architects from Florence. The programme of the Museum comprises the presentation of contemporary international art, education and research and publication projects. The two most important goals of MOCAK are the presentation of the art of the two last decades in the context of the post‑war avant‑garde and conceptual art and, secondly, elucidation of the rationale of making art through highlighting its cognitive and ethical values and its grounding in daily life. During the five years of its activities, the Museum has organised 106 exhibitions of Polish and international artists and produced over 80 publications.

MAXXI National Museum of 21st Century Arts is the first national museum dedicated to contemporary creativity. It opened in May 2010 and is run by a Private Foundation instituted by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism. Moreover, in 2013, it was recognized as being among the private institutes that also conduct research. Conceived as a large campus for culture, MAXXI, designed by Zaha Hadid, winner of an international tender, is a great architectural work featuring innovative and spectacular forms. MAXXI produces and hosts art, architecture, design and photography shows, as well as fashion, cinema and music projects, theater and dance performances, lectures and meetings with artists, architects, and some of the leading contemporary figures. MAXXI is more than just a museum: it is a platform open to all the languages of creativity, a place of encounter, exchange and collaboration, a space open to everyone. www.fondazionemaxxi.it

Culture.pl: Promoting Polish Artists Worldwide

The goal of Culture.pl, the Adam Mickiewicz Institute’s flagship brand, is to promote Poland and Polish culture internationally. Through the presentation of high-quality initiatives and events in fields such as design, music, and visual art, Culture.pl aspires to introduce an international audience to contemporary Polish culture. The Culture.pl website provides daily fresh information on the most exciting Polish cultural events worldwide; it is also the biggest and most comprehensive source of knowledge about Polish culture. A special section dedicated to visual arts includes information about the most intriguing exhibitions and the newest works by Polish artists – the young and up-and coming and the well-established and world-renowned.

Worldwide promotion of Polish art and its continuous support is one of the Adam Mickiewicz Institute’s main priorities. The Institute has supported and organized numerous exhibitions, artists’ residencies, study visits, and conferences on visual arts. Our success in the pursuit of this goal has been possible thanks to fruitful cooperation with renowned partners both in Poland and abroad. We have worked with, among others: the National Museum in Warsaw, the Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź, the Whitechapel Gallery (London), Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (Madrid) and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York).

Find out more: www.culture.pl