Małgorzata Mirga-Tas has become known for her large-format, colourful textile collages, in which certain sections are also painted. The Polish artist, born in Zakopane in 1978, exhibited at documenta fifteen in Kassel in 2022 and transformed the Polish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale into a narrative visual frieze with her textile collages.
Historical moments from the history of the Roma and scenes from everyday life create a self-confident and self-determined image of the community that has been persecuted and disregarded for centuries.
Małgorzata Mirga-Tas is a Bergkita-Roma. She grew up in n southern Poland in a Roma settlement near Czarna Góra at the brink of the Tatra mountains. She studied sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, and has been socially and culturally active in her community. She is an activist who campaigns for the interests of the Roma and wants to change and break down stereotypes, biases and stigmatisation.
Family members, artist friends, and personalities from the Roma community are often depicted in the pictures.
Sisterhood, community, family and relationships between the sexes play an important role. Małgorzata Mirga-Tas explores her origins, reflects prejudices that have hardened over centuries and reaches out with her artworks for a better mutual understanding.
In addition to her work with textile collages made from clothing, she also works with drawings, paintings, installations and sculptures.
"Her work serves as both a form of resistance and a vehicle for intellectual and creative decolonisation, firmly anchored in a profound sense of ethnic pride and self-acceptance. The process of Roma emancipation, at its core, entails the (re)shaping of individual subjectivities. Concurrently, it demands a critical examination of the stereotypes attributed to Roma, a dialogue that extends into the realms of politics, academia, and culture. By crafting their own narratives, the Roma community reclaims agency over the knowledge and imagery that the Gadjo (non-Roma) society has constructed without the participation of the Roma themselves. Through her visual storytelling, Małgorzata Mirga-Tas not only provides structure to their representation, but also asserts their self-definition, firmly opposing the widespread discrimination that the Roma communities experience."
Quote: Dr. Anna Mirga-Kruszelnicka for the exhibition "Jangare" at Foksal Gallery Foundation, Warsaw, 28.09. – 18.11.2023.
*1967 in Warsaw, Poland. Lives and works in Warsaw.
Work: Polka
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*1939 in Sławków, Poland. Lived in Wrocław, Poland, - died 2009 in Wrocław, Poland.
Work: Untitled (Vergessen)
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*1974 in Warsaw, Poland. Lives and works in Warsaw.
Work: Iranian Film Stills
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*1947 in Wrocław, Poland. Lives and works in Łomianki-Dąbrowa, Poland.
Work: The Splendour of Myself IV
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*1983 in Gorzów Wielkopolski, Poland. Lives and works in Poznan, Poland.
Work: Neighbour Bathroom Door
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*1976 in Gdańsk, Poland. Lives and works in Raba Niżna, Poland.
Work: Crossword Puzzle with Lady in Black Coat
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*1985 in Lublin, Poland. Lives and works in Warsaw, Poland.
Work: The Thousand-Year Plan
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*1981 in Białystok, Poland. Lives and works in Kolonia Koplany, Poland.
Work: Modell and Sketches ONCE INFORMATION HAS PASSED INTO PROTEIN
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