HOS Gallery Warsaw Explores Gift and Poison in Group Show

HOS Gallery in Warsaw presents 'The Gift / Das Gift,' a group exhibition curated by Marianna Łomża, running from April to June 6, 2026. The show features five Polish artists—Julia Szczerbowska, Kama Kicińska, Zuzanna Mazurek, Julia Bachur, and Amelia Woroszył—whose works examine the ambivalence of giving, where generosity and toxicity intertwine. Drawing on the Proto-Germanic root *geban/*giftiz, which evolved into both 'gift' in English and 'poison' in German, the exhibition probes how desire, devotion, and care can sustain or harm. Kicińska explores desire as a primal, deceptive force rooted in body and power. Mazurek's oil paintings highlight the precarious boundary between care and sacrifice, emphasizing choice. Szczerbowska and Bachur address sublimation and purification through traces of matter and the abject. Woroszył counters obscenity with enigmatic representations that resist interpretation. The exhibition does not resolve these tensions but makes them available for examination. Photography by Szymon Sokolowski.