Woman III

In a series of graphics created between 1975 and 1979 Izabella Gustowska (born in 1948) depicted a naked, heavy woman wearing a balaclava pulled over her head. In the 1970s, when Polish art and visual culture was dominated by overly aesthetic and erotic depiction of women’s bodies, such a brutal manner of portraying women was particularly rare. The change, which made the depictions of women more realistic, involved including the imperfections of their bodies and the physiological processes to which they are subjected, such as the effects of ageing, coincided with the so-called second wave of feminism that was on the rise at the time. Women artists thus brought upon a new way of looking at women, criticising the violent nature of culture that imposes oppressive canons of appearance and behaviour. Gustowska's artistic concept – portraying an almost naked woman wearing a balaclava – provokes the viewers to perceive Kobiety not only as an example of feminist art, but also in relation to the reality of the 1970s, with a wave of bloody terrorist attacks that swept through Western Europe. These acts of terror were carried out both by pro-Arab movements and European groups – separatist formations such as the Basque ETA and the Irish IRA, as well as leftist groups – the Italian Red Brigades, the German Red Army Faction also known as the Baader-Meinhof group, and many others. From this point of view, Gustowska's Kobiety series, which was created during the rise of European terrorism, can be seen as one of its first visual representations and a prophetic vision of a future in which terrorist acts have entered the repertoire of social violence.

Magdalena Lewoc