Manifesta 16 takes place in empty churches in four cities of the Ruhr Valley. The travelling Biennale investigates how we can reimagine empty church buildings as spaces for civic life, physical well-being and community encounter.
Among the more than 100 artists is Małgorzata Mirga-Tas with an installation at Christ König Church in Bochum, consisting of art works related to three different series 'From the series of 29 / Ryćhino (Roma Bear) / Jangare. The realisation of the installation was supported by AMMODO, The Adam Mickiewicz Institute and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland and Art Collection Telekom.
Beside the 'Jangare' figures (from jangar 'coal' in Romani), which refer to fortune telling or removing evil spells, there are the 'Bears', which refer to the long tradition of taming of wild animals.
The 'series of 29' commemorates an event from July 1942 when German military police, together with Polish police officers, detained a group of 29 Roma men and women. Three men, five women and over 20 children were shot by the Germans and Poles. Their bodies were thrown into a pit dug at the site of the execution. In July 2011, at Cygańskie Górki, or Romani Hills as local residents have called the area near the town of Borzęcin Dolny in the south-east of Poland – Roma sculptor Małgorzata Mirga-Tas erected a wooden monument. Małgorzata Mirga-Tas designed a monument consisting of a vertical slab with an epitaph featuring an excerpt from a poem by the Polish-Romani poet Papusza. Located on both sides of the epitaph plaque were figures of dying Roma men and women. Four years later, in the spring of 2016, unknown perpetrators destroyed the monument. Based on fragments of the vandalised monument, Małgorzata Mirga-Tas created a series of wax sculptures that commemorate both the original murders and the subsequent act of destruction.
