I work across sculpture, photography, and installation, with a particular focus on fabrics—used clothing, printed, or dyed textiles. I create sculptures that explore the interplay between soft/hard and tension developed through the genre of body horror, where forms resembling intestines, organs, organisms and monstrous shapes emerge.

Food has been a recurring element in my work, serving as a material starting point. I gather organic waste, forage, collect friends’ hair after haircuts, approaching this process with the care and attention of a meal preparation. These materials are either developed into physical objects, photographed and then printed to create a new sculptural form, or used as dyes.

Through my work, I emphasize matter as a living and active participant of reality. I am interested in human and non human bodies and the wider material world of uneven and porous interactions we are in. Through the lens of biological processes such as composting, digesting, breathing,
I explore the dynamic relations of our bodies and how they extend beyond the skin. They are not fixed or isolated, but rather fluid and in constant dialogue with the world. I ask what runs through, across, and beyond them, how other agents affect us. By questioning the stability of the individual body, I address the global and material impacts of late capitalism and climate change, and how they shape, and are shaped by our embodiment.

My work invites visceral, tactile responses, creating metaphors for how we co-emerge with other forms of matter, performing a dance between various agencies. By navigating the intersections of opposites—self/other, internal/external —I draw on the concept of the abject. I seek to bring the derived sensations how breakdowns in meaning disturb definitions and to highlight the strange power which seems to suggest we are drawn to that which repels us.

contact@joannawierzbicka.com

Education