Paulina Garbiec – I disappeared | The Art of Sensitivity

About

Paulina Garbiec’s exhibition responds to a deeply personal experience of dissociation – a defense mechanism that allows one to endure when emotions become overwhelming. Dissociation brings with it a sense of separation from reality. The artist invites us into a space where disappearing is not only an escape, but also a form of protection and a temporary refuge.

I Disappeared is an invitation to journey through moments of vanishing – to step behind the curtain that separates the exhibition from everyday life. The show does not frame dissociation as absence or avoidance, but reveals its protective, life-sustaining dimension. The exhibition space becomes a soft, welcoming environment that offers the chance to simply be with oneself in friendly surroundings. It is an invitation to experience how “disappearing” can become a form of self-care – a mechanism that provides the strength to survive and to return.

About the artist

Paulina Garbiec — mosaic artist. She graduated with distinction in landscape architecture and channels her passion for shaping space by bringing art into the city. She is the co-founder of Społeczna Pracownia Mozaiki (Social Mosaic Workshop). Major projects she has worked on include: the mosaic for the “Talerzyki” fountain in Niedźwiadków Park, Tychy (2021); the reconstruction of the mosaic on the “Rodzina / Family” monument by Jerzy Egon Kwiatkowski, Katowice (2016); the design and execution of a mosaic for the canteen at the Tadeusz Kościuszko Transport and Communication Schools Complex in Lublin (2021); and the renovation and partial reconstruction of a mosaic by Barbara Pniewska at University Clinical Hospital No. 4 in Lublin (2024).

She has collaborated with, among others, the National Institute of Architecture and Urban Planning, the City Museum in Tychy, the Museum of Housing Estates in Lublin, and Katowice Street Art Festival. She leads workshops in mosaic art and architectural education. In her practice, she is drawn to the process of disintegration—the breakdown that allows a work to come into being.

Garbiec presented her solo exhibition “Codzienność / Everyday” at the Museum of Housing Estates in Lublin at the turn of 2024/2025, and took part in the group shows “A*tystki” at Galeria Labirynt, Lublin (2023) and “A*tystki w trasie” at Galeria Epizod, Toruń (2024). Her work “Serce miasta / The Mosaic heart of the city” was shown during Night of Culture 2025.

Curator: Agata Sztorc-Gromaszek