Affairs, Betrayals and Flirtations / lecture from the "Art on Temptation" series
About the event
In the next meeting of the “Art on Temptation” series we will look behind the closed doors of paintings. We’ll embark on a journey full of intimate games and furtive glances, where love, desire and secrecy intertwine with everyday life. We’ll start with Netherlandish painting and depictions of women reading letters in domestic alcoves, where every gesture and detail holds its own secrets.
Watteau, Boucher and Fragonard will carry us into a world of love intrigues played out in gardens and the perfume-scented boudoirs of the Rococo. The 19th century will take us to a Paris pulsing with can-can, where performance mixes with intimacy and closeness is put on public display. Finally, contemporary art will show us the image of the lovers. Sometimes it will be, as with Abramović, Nan Goldin or Sophie Calle, a painful, fragile, risky relationship. Sometimes, as in the work of Wilhelm Sasnal, intimacy will be quiet, safe and domestic. The axis of all these narratives will not be the sexual act, but the emotions of the protagonists: their desire, euphoria, tenderness and trust, and sometimes pain, fear and despair.
Host:
- Monika Przypkowska — art historian, museum educator, exhibition curator. She graduated in art history from the University of Warsaw. Since 1996 she has collaborated with the Royal Castle in Warsaw, conducting museum lessons for children and youth in the fields of art history, culture and fashion, lectures for adults and courses for city guides and schoolteachers. She works in the Education Department at the Castle and cooperates with other institutions involved in art education: the National Museum in Warsaw, the Children’s and Youth Art Academy, the Mazovian University of the Third Age, the Ursynów University of the Third Age, Studio Sztuki and the School Complex of Printing. Since early 2022 she has collaborated with “Radio z Qulturą”, where her original programme “Sztukomodnie” is broadcast.
About the series:
Everything you’d like to know about temptation but were afraid to ask — past and contemporary art will tell it to you in the first person. These will be stories about great feasts and realms of idleness, tavern brawls and gold fever, and finally about affairs, betrayals and flirtations. From works by the old masters, through film narratives, to stage creations of big pop stars. It will be lively!
Organisation:
- Offline: auditorium with an audience — free admission
- Online: broadcast on the SDK Facebook profile
- Translation: Polish Sign Language
Article illustration: Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Les Hasards heureux de l’escarpolette.
