Polish Artists and Institutions in Antiauthoritarian Protests

Kuba Szreder argues that contemporary art played a meaningful role in Poland's antiauthoritarian turn, particularly through feminist protests against the 2020 abortion ban. Artists and institutions contributed via feminist exhibitions like 'Who Will Write the History of Tears' at the Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (2021) and 'You'll Never Walk Alone' at Galeria Labirynt in Lublin (2020). Protest visual culture featured a 'cardboard aesthetic'—makeshift banners and props—often displayed in 'groves of banners' at the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw. Museums began collecting protest banners as artefacts. Szreder notes that while art alone did not topple the government, it contributed to the broader wave that ended the Law and Justice regime in 2023. He sees potential for reimagining artistic institutions through partnerships with social movements, emphasizing a shift away from globalized artworld models toward artistic commons.