Curatorial Concept
Niedźwiednik Resort
Stretching across moraine hills and surrounded by the Tricity Landscape Park, Niedźwiednik is a residential estate whose location, form, and atmosphere resemble a health resort. Long before the area took on its current architectural form, its natural resources and favourable microclimate made it a preferred spot for sports, leisure, and recreation.
Can a housing estate become a year-round sanatorium for its residents? Most of us visit spa and leisure facilities only occasionally, as guests or tourists – but what if the estate we live in could become our own health resort? The NARRACJE festival in Niedźwiednik seeks to reinterpret the concept of a spa town, inviting all residents and guests to join in a walk to discover everyday rituals rooted in local histories.
Recognising the area’s natural and scenic qualities, the designers of this late-modernist estate, initiated in the 1970s, envisioned numerous spaces for leisure and recreation, some of which were eventually constructed. Architects Szczepan Baum and Danuta Dzierżanowska ensured that the buildings varied in terms of scale and form and were integrated into the landscape. High-rise tower blocks with “smiling” balconies, low blocks of flats, and stepped “zigzag” terrace houses create an intriguing dialogue with the “mountainous” features of this green enclave.
The curatorial duo conceived the festival as a journey, inviting visitors, alongside participating artists, to discover local histories, architectural intentions, and the estate’s natural potential. NARRACJE#15 is designed to evoke experiences of sightseeing trips, historical tourism, spa holidays, or pilgrimages. Among the boulders, natural resources, and modernist architecture nestled in the moraine hills, the audience is encouraged to drift freely, discover the existing ecosystems, and collaboratively create new narratives.
Aleksandra Wilde, daughter of architect Szczepan Baum, recalls that “[…] father was most concerned about preserving the existing ecosystems and creating conditions to live together, side by side, not just with neighbours but also with nature […]”.
Inspired by the architects’ intentions, we propose a creative debate on the relationship between humans and nature – within the framework of the modernist paradigm and contemporary environmental needs. Discovering spa-like qualities within a residential estate represents an artistic activation of local potential and an attempt to reconsider the changing notions of spa and sanatorium, as well as our evolving perceptions of health, wellbeing, and self-care.
curators: Zuzanna Mielczarek and Mateusz Włodarek
