In the age saturated with images, our vision is rarely our own. Political campaigns, media narratives, and the weight of historical memory continually blur the line between what we see and what we are told to see. Kantor. Vision Therapy, the latest exhibition at Cricoteka in Kraków, invites us to pause, adjust the lens, and survey our world again, more sharply and honestly.
Rather than tracing the path of Tadeusz Kantor’s legacy, the curators of this exhibition have assembled an “optical instrument” built from his works and interventions by an international group of contemporary artists. Six thematic constellations, ranging from I is Someone Else to (Ob)livion, form a kaleidoscopic space where painting, performance, archival traces, and multimedia works intertwine. Together, they act less as static displays and more as catalysts, unsettling our habitual gaze and opening uncomfortable yet necessary fields of vision.
“We live in a culture dominated by images. They not only influence how we perceive reality but also how we behave, what choices we make, and even what we desire. This makes the ability to see critically and to interpret visual messages independently absolutely fundamental. These abilities are constantly being weakened, both by increasingly sophisticated means of visual persuasion and by the weight of individual and collective traumas that distort our perception of ourselves and the world”, as co-curator Jarosław Suchan explains. The very metaphor of “vision therapy” grew from a need to address the way images shape our world: “The idea behind this exhibition was to create something that could strengthen these weakened abilities, in other words to heal our deformed gaze” Suchan continues. “Kantor constantly confronted the image as something that hides reality and creates illusion, but at the same time allows us to glimpse its less obvious, even impossible side. His work seemed a perfect material for creating such a therapeutic device”.
It is in this dynamic interplay between Kantor’s past and the present urgencies of war, dehumanisation, and fractured identity that the exhibition seeks to perform its therapy. As Suchan suggests, the works are not simply shown, but rather activated to “snap our vision from a state of numbness” [Also, read about the Cricoteka’s Costume Sculpture Body – Kantor’s Theatrical Objects exhibition in Sibiu, Romania – here]. The exhibition is curated by Jarosław Suchan and Kamil Kuitkowski, along with Małgorzata Paluch-Cybulska, Magdalena Ujma, and Natalia Zarzecka, with curatorial collaboration of Thibaut de Ruyter.
“It is in this dynamic interplay between Kantor’s past and the present urgencies of war, dehumanisation, and fractured identity that the exhibition seeks to perform its therapy.”
Constellations in Conversation
The role of the viewer, as described by co-curator Natalia Zarzecka, is central and entirely self-determined. “From my perspective, the role of the audience is their own, it is not imposed”, she explains. “Of course, we guide visitors through the individual constellations, introducing the themes of each room, but we leave it entirely to their interpretation. Each of us will see something different in this exhibition. The very nature of trauma and memory is so individual that it is difficult to impose. While people often assume Kantor dictated roles to his actors, he always left the viewer as the most important figure — an individual with their own experiences and their own way of interpreting what they encounter”.
This emphasis on freedom naturally extends to the way the exhibition itself is arranged. For co-curator Kamil Kuitkowski, the decision to divide the exhibition into six thematic constellations was both a conceptual and spatial choice. “This division grew partly from reflecting on Kantor’s work and partly from the issues we face today”, he says. “We wanted to show that his art is not mechanical or locked in the past. Themes such as the feeling of estrangement from oneself, the power of objects that surround us, the shadow of catastrophe, or the possibility of revolution through art remain relevant. The form of the exhibition encourages viewers to move freely, to return to certain points, and to explore without following a chronological narrative. That freedom of movement is exactly what we want to encourage”.
As Suchan stresses, it is dialogical by design. “The exhibition is not meant as a single, authoritative interpretation of Kantor or of how we see. It is a space where constellations of images, objects, and texts allow for different sensual, emotional, and intellectual experiences. It is not monologic, but an attempt to create conditions for dialogue. We hope it strengthens the very capacities that dialogue requires, above all, openness to different ways of seeing and understanding the world”.
This physical openness also reflects a curatorial philosophy of dialogue. The constellation structure is not only spatial, but also conceptual, allowing Kantor’s works to converse with contemporary interventions rather than remain isolated in history.
Suchan adds that the choice of contemporary artists was not based on purely visual similarities, but on the ability of their works to enter into dialogue with Kantor’s ideas. “The starting point was not resemblance, but the possibility of complementing, complicating, or sometimes polemicising with the intuitions we see in Kantor’s art, which still make it relevant today”, he stresses and adds how “Marysia Lewandowska’s work, for example, deals with the ambivalent issue of subjectivity and the relationship between author and actor. Her focus on Maria Stangret raises questions about how agency can both strengthen and suppress others. Similarly, Alexandra Bachzetsis’s performance Secret Instructions stages instructions from canonical twentieth-century plays, asking whether performers interpreting them become authors themselves or remain mere tools. Works by Aneta Grzeszykowska, Christoph Schlingensief, and Gisèle Vienne address trauma, difficult memory, and the fear of being forgotten – themes that marked Kantor’s late work and remain painfully relevant today. Nikita Kadan’s installation, referencing the war in Ukraine, also brings the horror of wartime experience into direct conversation with Kantor’s The Dead Class”.
“The constellation structure is not only spatial, but also conceptual, allowing Kantor’s works to converse with contemporary interventions rather than remain isolated in history.”
Marysia Lewandowska: Reframing the Archive
The exhibition features works by a diverse range of international artists, including Alexandra Bachzetsis in collaboration with Julia Born, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Marysia Lewandowska, Nikita Kadan, Goshka Macuga, the “List” 2020 team, Christoph Schlingensief, and Gisèle Vienne. Invited by the curators, these contemporary artists’ works open Kantor’s legacy to new interpretations and connect it with pressing social, political, and existential questions of today.
For instance, Marysia Lewandowska presents a video installation. Known for a practice that frequently engages with archives, public space, memory, and access to cultural material, Lewandowska often uses moving image and sound to surface overlooked or erased narratives. In Kantor. Vision Therapy, her contribution resonates with the curators’ intent to sharpen perception, offering a lens through which Kantor’s work can be reimagined in dialogue with contemporary concerns.
Her work began with a choice of theme that has been central to her practice for years: the lack of recognition for women’s achievements, especially when their contributions are overshadowed by their male partners. “In the case of Tadeusz Kantor and Maria Stangret, who had worked in partnership since the 1950s, I wanted to correct the dominant narrative in the viewer’s mind”, Lewandowska explains. “My starting point was research in the Cricoteka archive. The idea to create two films was not only about literally shifting attention from Kantor to his wife and collaborator, but also about reflecting on the role of institutions and the media in shaping the image and voice of an artist”.
“I often begin new projects with archival research”, Lewandowska further says. “This time, it was invaluable not only because it allowed me to access rarely shown materials, such as video recordings of Cricot 2 rehearsals or interviews with Stangret after Kantor’s death, but also because of conversations with the curators and members of her family. In dialogue with them, I felt a need to symbolically safeguard an inaccessible legacy that represents an important part of the shared life and work of both artists. The filmic ‘psychoanalysis’ of their apartment at Spokojna Street should be seen as the missing voice that must not be overlooked in a multifaceted exhibition of Kantor’s collection”.
For Lewandowska, the exhibition’s constellation I is Someone Else felt the most relevant to her work as “The issue of identity seemed crucial for situating the relationship between such a strong personality as Kantor – with his constant blurring of boundaries between life, theatre, art, and philosophy – and the role of his closest collaborators”, she says. “Directing attention to Maria Stangret as someone who both experienced and grappled with the ‘creative tyranny’ of her husband is key to my project”.
An “Optical Instrument” in Practice
Lewandowska’s video installation functions as an “optical instrument” by confronting the viewer with two stylistically and narratively distinct films, both giving voice to Maria Stangret. “One film uses a simple reversal of an existing piece of documentary footage”, she explains. “In the original from 1968, filmed at the former Nazi rally grounds in Nuremberg, Kantor wraps Stangret in toilet paper in what he called the ‘Great Emballage’. By reversing the footage, I symbolically and literally ‘unwrap’ her, suggesting a potential reversal of roles”.
“The second film offers an intimate portrait of the Kantors’ apartment and studio, highlighting her presence as a painter, an organiser of daily life, and someone respected within the community. The final sequence features her voice saying, ‘the impossible becomes possible’, a phrase that resonates as both liberation and affirmation of sovereignty”.
Through these works, Lewandowska invites viewers to reflect on their own habits of seeing and to critically reassess the narratives surrounding Kantor’s legacy. Her work sharpens that invitation into something deeply personal. By shifting focus from Kantor to Maria Stangret, she reframes the archive and opens a conversation about voice, authorship, and the politics of recognition. In doing so, she extends the exhibition’s central premise into a living practice of looking differently.
Looking beyond the frame
Kantor. Vision Therapy refuses to let the eye settle. It asks viewers to approach familiar images and narratives with fresh uncertainty, to notice what has been hidden in plain sight, and to remain attentive to the silences that shape cultural memory. For curators, this openness is essential – the exhibition is not a definitive statement but an invitation to explore.
To step into Kantor. Vision Therapy is to risk leaving with altered vision. What we see there – and what we fail to see – becomes part of the work itself. In a world that thrives on spectacle, such moments of slow, deliberate seeing may be the rarest form of resistance.
“Kantor. Vision Therapy refuses to let the eye settle. It asks viewers to approach familiar images and narratives with fresh uncertainty, to notice what has been hidden in plain sight, and to remain attentive to the silences that shape cultural memory.”
Kantor. Vision Therapy
Cricoteka, Kraków, Poland
