Freedom

Technique: steel installation

Dimensions: –

Object: Emilia Kalkowska-Marszałek’s Freedom installation forms part of the Gdańsk Open-Air Sculpture Gallery. It was created as part of the “Crossroads of Freedom” Festival of Spatial Forms, inspired by the idea of freedom in Gdańsk. The event took place from 2009 to 2019 and included an international spatial form and artistic installation competition, an international wood sculpture plein-air, a seminar on art in public space and numerous accompanying events. Freedom, the main idea of the festival, was also the theme of the annual competition. It was understood not only in terms of the subject matter, but also form of execution and freedom of artistic expression.

Kalkowska-Marszałek’s Freedom won an honourable mention in the festival competition and was consequently implemented in urban space, at Kliniczna Junction. The installation, designed as a rebus, consists of spatial block letters forming the word “FREE” and an openwork structure in the form of a very schematically presented house (dom in Polish). The letters in the installation are three-dimensional, massive, almost monumental and form a kind of wall, symbolizing a barrier that has to be overcome in order to gain freedom. They are made of ordinary black steel, which easily succumbs to atmospheric conditions – consequently, the letters rust. The form and rusty colour were inspired by the nearby area of the former Gdańsk shipyard. The openwork structure symbolizing a house complements the rebus: the word “FREEDOM”. The artist treats the symbolic house as a space of freedom, an enclave of privacy and security. The structure of the house is made of metal angle bars and coloured blue. It is light, producing a contrast between the heavy letters and the delicate, openwork structure. It is possible to walk through the “house”, the installation enables interaction, which was extremely important to the artist. As Emilia Kalkowska-Marszałek described her work, the multidimensional meaning of freedom was one of her main fields of interpretation. Through this work she wanted to talk about its unlimited character and the right to freedom vested in every human being. The work was created in the shipyard and assembled under the artist’s direction. The chosen location at Kliniczna Junction, against the background of the shipyard cranes, perfectly completes the whole project.

Place: The artistic projects implemented within the framework of the “Crossroads of Freedom” Festival of Spatial Forms in Gdańsk were located around almost the entire city. The placement of the Freedom installation in the area of Kliniczna Junction is significant for several reasons. First of all, the proximity of the former Gdańsk Shipyard perfectly corresponds to both the idea of the work and the material it was made of. Kliniczna Junction is one of the most famous transport junctions in Gdańsk; it is located on Kliniczna Street, on the border between the districts of Młyniska and Wrzeszcz Dolny. The trumpet junction was established in 1977 and is formed by Marynarki Polskiej Street joined from the east by Kliniczna Street, which connects it to Hallera Street from the west. Kliniczna Junction is also a unique place because of its artistic connotations: it has become a forum for live art thanks to the murals created here. In 2000, Klub Winda organized the 1^st Nationwide Festival of Mural Painting – Kliniczna Junction. This unusual, transitory space was used as the venue for the Open Gallery of Mural Painting on the concrete pillars supporting the flyover. The many years of the festival saw a number of paintings on current social problems created on the pillars of Kliniczna Junction, which became a place of freedom of expression.

Information about the author: Emilia Kalkowska-Marszałek is a sculptor and interior designer. She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk, graduating from Prof. Katarzyna Józefowicz’s studio, and at KUVA-Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki, Finland. Kalkowska-Marszałek works with ceramics, artistic glass, drawing and photography. She designed the You Can Dream Here neon sign presented in Oliwa as part of the “Crossroads of Freedom” Festival of Spatial Forms in 2014 as well as Emotional Bending of Space created as part of the Nationwide Academic Cooperation Platform at the Centre of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko.

Condition of the object: no remarks

Owner/guardian: Gdańsk Community Foundation

Author of the entry: Dorota Kucharczyk