Fundacja Dom Kultury is preparing an exhibition summarising ten years of W Kratkę magazine, created since 2013 by women incarcerated in the Warsaw-Grochów Remand Centre in collaboration with visual artists.
At the end of 2026, Fundacja Dom Kultury will present an exhibition marking the tenth anniversary of W Kratkę – a unique project that has been developed since 2013 in the Warsaw-Grochów Remand Centre.
W Kratkę is one of the most interesting initiatives combining contemporary art, cultural education and socially engaged activities carried out in Polish prisons. The magazine is created by women serving prison sentences in collaboration with visual artists, designers, educators and editors. Each issue brings together two worlds: the experiences of incarcerated people and the language of contemporary culture and art.
In 2026, the tenth anniversary issue of the magazine will be published. To celebrate this occasion, we are preparing an exhibition presenting the achievements of the project and the story of a collaboration that, for more than a decade, has connected incarcerated people with renowned contemporary artists and a younger generation of creators.
What will be on display?
The exhibition will feature original artworks published in W Kratkę, including drawings, prints, illustrations, objects and projects created specifically for individual issues of the magazine. These will be accompanied by selected editorial materials, photographs and documentation of the magazine’s development.
The exhibition will present not only finished artworks but also the collaborative process between incarcerated participants and artists. Visitors will be able to see how successive issues of the magazine were created, how relationships developed between participants, and what role art played in fostering dialogue, agency and participation.
Artists
Over the past ten years, the magazine has brought together both established figures of Polish contemporary art and emerging artists. The exhibition may include works by Paweł Althamer, Artur Żmijewski, Daniel Rycharski, Małgorzata Jabłońska, Piotr Szewczyk, Dorota Podlaska, Dariusz Vasina, Beata Sosnowska, Agnieszka Dybowska, Agnieszka Gójska, Magda Byczewska, Anna Tyczyńska, Agnieszka Semaniszyn-Konat, Justyna Kabala, Darren Kruk and Paweł Dunal.
An important part of the exhibition will also be works by students of the Graphic Design Department at SWPS University, who have contributed illustrations and graphic designs to the magazine for several years.
Venue
The exhibition will be presented in the foyer of Komuna Warszawa Theatre, one of Poland’s leading independent cultural institutions. The open nature of the foyer will make the exhibition accessible both to visitors coming specifically to see it and to audiences attending performances and other events organised by the theatre.
Publication and accompanying activities
An integral part of the project will be a publication containing a curatorial text and a selection of materials documenting the history of W Kratkę and the activities developed around it since 2013. The publication will serve as a lasting record of the project and a tool for disseminating its results.
Why is it important?
W Kratkę is more than a magazine. It is a long-term process of cultural education, empowerment, self-advocacy and increasing the visibility of incarcerated people in public life. The project demonstrates that culture can be a tool for communication, cooperation and social inclusion, while art can create a space for encounters between people who normally live on opposite sides of prison walls.
The exhibition will provide an opportunity to look back at ten years of this extraordinary collaboration and at art created in places where it is not usually expected to be found.
The project is co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage from the Culture Promotion Fund – a state special-purpose fund, under the Cultural Education Programme
