Pięć / Five / Fünf

The protagonists of this piece are three letters: the German Ö, the Ukrainian Г and the Polish Ć. These letters all have a certain history related to power structures and forms of resistance. Each of them is the fifth letter of the alphabet. Written on the fabric are interviews conducted with people with refugee and migration experiences, who talk about assimilation through the lens of learning and speaking a new language. These stories were embroidered in English, German, Ukrainian, Polish, Hebrew, and Yiddish. The work is intended for display in a staircase – it should be viewed and read while descending or ascending a flight of stairs. Viewing the work in motion is a reference to the theme of migration, to which the fabric is dedicated.

The form and colours refer to the social, spatial sculptures created by Katarzyna Kobro. Two techniques of writing have been combined in the fabric: hand embroidery and ink printing.

The printed letters belong to the order of gaining and maintaining power, the production of knowledge and audible, repeated discourse.

The embroidered letters belong somewhere in the space between print and informal speech.

They carry personal, invisible, inaudible stories, stories written outside the rules of grammar and spelling, outside official events and history.