Making art in the Białowieża Forest: from late avant-garde plein-air to artistic field research

Abstract

This text examines the cultural (visual) constructions of the Białowieża Forest and their transformations from the mid-20th to the early 21st century. To do so, selected art events in Białowieża are analysed, with a focus on cyclical events organised during the peak of the Polish plein-air art festival movement (Ogólnopolski Plener Białowieski, Białowieża 1965–1983) and a 2016 artistic field research project Wracając do Białowieży [Returning to Białowieża], organised and curated by Tomasz Koszewnik and Jan Szewczyk. The comparison of the tenets and ideological foundations of the events illustrates the changes that occurred in the understanding of the idea of ‘situatedness’ or site-specificity of art produced in the natural environment or in direct response to it. Moreover, it allows for a discussion of the relationship between artistic ideas of working in nature and the construction of nature (or parts thereof) as both an ideological concept and a broadly understood resource (a source of material, inspiration, knowledge, etc.).