JOANNA PIOTROWSKA I Are We Home Yet?

The exhibition opens on Saturday, 4 September 2021 from noon–6 pm.

Extended opening hours during the DC Open Galleries Weekend from 3-5 September 2021.


At the start of the new season, Galerie Thomas Zander is pleased to present two site-specific solo exhibitions of work by Joanna Piotrowska and Peter Downsbrough, featuring works from various media including black and white photography, film, sculpture and wall pieces.

Born in Poland in 1985 and based in London, Joanna Piotrowska works across photography, film, and performance. Galerie Thomas Zander is especially proud to present Are We Home Yet? as her first solo exhibition with the gallery. 


Piotrowska’s work explores human relations and their gestures of care, self-protection and control. Inspired by a range of sources from illustrated self-defence manuals to feminist psychology, her practise challenges conventional settings and assumptions, such as the common equation of the home with notions of family and safety. In her black and white photographs and performance films, the artist shows her actors in poses and interactions, leaving viewers uncertain about their relation to each other and the space around them, thus making the situation appear gentle one time and un­comfortable another. The images feel charged, also revealing the potential of solitude and violence that can develop in domestic dynamics. Piotrowska’s exhibitions are always site-specific and create a trans­formed environment for the reception of her works. Furnishing the exhibition space with carpets and curtains, she leads the viewers into ambiguous spaces – intimate yet public – to experience the domestic settings of her work.


Joanna Piotrowska studied Photography at the Royal College of Art in London and the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków. Her work has been included in the 10th Berlin Biennale (2018) and Being: New Photography at MoMA, New York (2018). Recent solo exhibitions were held at Tate Britain, London; Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, Warsaw, Kunsthalle Basel, and most recently at the Rocket Station Hombroich. Piotrowska is the recipient of the 2018 Lewis Baltz Research Fund and the MACK First Book Award. Her third book Stable Vices was published this year.

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