Sculpture After Stability

A large survey of contemporary sculpture at MSN, with works by more than thirty artists from Poland and abroad. The starting point is the loss of formal stability - treated not as a warning of catastrophe, but as a source of creative tension. The objects extend past the galleries into corridors, the stairwell and the building’s shared spaces.

Muzeum Sztuki Nowoczesnej on the exhibition:

The exhibition presents contemporary sculptural practices that take the loss of formal stability as their starting point, treating it not as a metaphor for crisis or a harbinger of catastrophe, but as a source of creative tension. What was once considered the goal of sculptural activity-durability, closure, and the perfection of the final result-today seems insufficient. In a world losing its footing, sculpture does not pretend to be a foundation. Form does not disappear; instead, it becomes a temporary arrangement of processes, tensions, and relationships.

The exhibition gathers works by artists who treat sculpture as a system of forces: flows and changes, tensions and dependencies between process and mass. References to biological forms and the human body highlight sculpture as an impermanent structure, susceptible to pressure, wear, and modification. Fluid transitions between artificial and natural materials, organic shapes, and forms inspired by mechanical production emphasize the metamorphic potential of matter. It is not a passive medium but bears traces of its origin, use, and contact with bodies. The exhibition brings out these characteristics, presenting sculpture as a statement materially situated within the museum space. The objects interact with the building’s architecture, cooperate with light and audience movement, spilling into corridors, the stairwell, and other common areas. They do not create a linear narrative but a temporary scenography for bodies and objects in motion-a scaffolding for incidental relationships.

In this shared field of action, the following artists meet: Isabelle Andriessen, Patricia Ayres, Olga Balema, Beatrice Bonino, Manuel Burgener, Giulia Cenci, Phoebe Collings-James, June Crespo, Michael Dean, Matyáš Fiala, Zuza Golińska, Alexandra Hunts, Agata Ingarden, Edith Karlson, Kaarel Kurismaa, Mónica Mays, Gizela Mickiewicz, Narges Mohammadi, Anna Myszkowiak, Jack O’Brien, B. Ingrid Olson, Dominika Olszowy, Katarzyna Przezwańska, Jessi Reaves, Ken Sortais, Teresa Solar Abboud, Iza Tarasewicz, Tatiana Trouvé, Kaari Upson, Dominique White, Nicole Wermers.

Their works reinforce the idea of art whose strength arises from incompleteness and susceptibility to change. Instead of a catastrophic narrative, an energy-generating practice of reorganization emerges: connecting what is dispersed, supporting what is fragile, and creating conditions for further transformations.

What to expect

Expect sculpture treated as a system of forces: flows and changes, tensions and dependencies between process and mass. Instead of closed, durable forms, you get works in which form is a temporary arrangement, susceptible to pressure, wear and modification. Many objects reference biological forms and the human body, and materials shift fluidly between artificial and natural, between organic shapes and forms inspired by mechanical production. Matter here carries traces of its origin, its use and its contact with bodies.

Worth knowing before you go: this is not an exhibition arranged as a linear narrative you walk through from point A to point B. The works engage the architecture of the MSN building, the light and the movement of the audience, and some of them spill into corridors, the stairwell and other common areas. Look around outside the galleries too, and leave yourself time to double back.

The artist list is long and international - among others Isabelle Andriessen, Olga Balema, Giulia Cenci, June Crespo, Michael Dean, Zuza Golińska, Agata Ingarden, Gizela Mickiewicz, Dominika Olszowy, Katarzyna Przezwańska, Iza Tarasewicz, Tatiana Trouvé, Kaari Upson, Dominique White and Nicole Wermers. The exhibition runs from 16 October 2026 to 28 February 2027.

Tickets, opening hours, and current details are on the Museum of Modern Art website.

Museum profile: Muzeum Sztuki Nowoczesnej.