Changes in the Ocean. On the Art of Agata Madejska

Utopia and its fallacious hopes return also in another work, Voyage, Voyage (2018), which assumes the form of a carpet with geometric patterns, an allusion to a swathe of land purchased in 1848 in Texas by the radical socialist Etienne Cabet for his Icarian community. The particular shape of the plots resulted from a division entailed by a contract between the state authorities and the company selling the land. The division hindered the fledgling commune’s development and nearly led to its collapse. This work has been juxtaposed with the Technocomplex series, which remains an example of the brutality of entropy developing in designed space.

For the Wilhelmshaven show, Madejska has also prepared a work that appears to be a continuation of solaristic observations, this time conducted with the aid of mathematical formulas. Simon Says (2018) is a series inspired by the Josephus permutation,[9] a theoretical problem in combinatorial mathematics, which for the artist becomes an opportunity to reflect on the randomness of or even to predict  bulges and tensions in political space, especially those related to racial or religious conflicts or lack of empathy.[10] However, as it often happens for solarists and for Madejska too, the ocean remains unperturbed here, and in this particular case, grey.

Sharing the same tonality is yet another series made for Modified Limited Hangout, titled RISE (2018). These are special works for the show, looking as if straight out of a Lem-style science-fiction laboratory – images of photochemical smog caused by the interaction of ultraviolet solar radiation with a high concentration of exhaust fumes and industrial emissions. RISE is an extreme record of the entropy materializing in present-day space, notably in big cities. In Madejska’s formulation, those are samples of changes, of factors that the Leviathan hasn’t yet responded to, perhaps hasn’t even noticed.

With RISE, Madejska crosses the boundary where the invisible filling of political space, something that affects us all, becomes a visible hyperobject. From the Factum series, where she first attempted to create a new image, she has arrived here through her alchemical technique at an absolutely unique achievement. The probes she released have revealed a new entity.

Jakub Śwircz, November 2019