Galeria Centrala
pl. Ratajskiego 6a, Poznań
śr – pt 15-19 oraz sb* 12-16
Night of Museums 20.05, 17-23.30


Mariusz Śmiejek’s NOT SURRENDERING exhibition is a visual story about loyalists’ struggle for their own identity in post-conflict Northern Ireland. The author introduces us to the everyday life of the British working class and members of its illegal paramilitary groups, until recently regarded as terrorist organizations that arouse respect, spread fear and control the province. It is a story about the space in which the project’s protagonists live and about the specificity of the “cage architecture” designed to separate the British from the Irish – the psychological state of being under siege in the working-class districts of Northern Ireland. The story also illustrates the atmosphere of hopelessness accompanying successive generations trapped morally and mentally in unresolved traumas of the past from which they fail to free themselves. The aim of the exhibition is to present knowledge about the processes of integration of post-conflict societies, which differ from each other for territorial, national and religious reasons. April 2023 marked the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, which ended the conflict in Northern Ireland.


Mariusz Śmiejek – an independent documentary photographer, dealing mainly with long-term social topics, e.g. everyday life in post-conflict Northern Ireland (2010-2020) and the causes and effects of migration from West Africa to Europe (2017-2022). Winner of many prestigious awards and distinctions in Poland and abroad, e.g. National Geographic magazine (2011, 2012, 2015) Grand Press Photo (2017, 2018), IPA in the USA and Sony World Photo Award. Author of many individual and collective exhibitions in the United States, Great Britain, Italy, Hong Kong, Ghana and Poland. He teaches photography in the UK, Ireland, Italy, Poland, Portugal and Ghana. His photos have appeared in in: The New York Times, National Geographic, Time, Der Spiegel, The British Journal of Photography, FotoEvidence and many others. He has collaborated with from Deutsche Press Agentur and Visum Images – www.mariuszsmiejek.com

Organization of the exhibition: Centrala Gallery, Fotspot, Mariusz Śmiejek

Exhibition patronage: FOTOGRAFIA Quarterly, Wide Kadr, Fotopolis.pl, National Geographic, Traveler, FotoCamp, Foto-tapeta.org.pl, Kontynenty, IKS Monthly, NN6T, ZPAF, UAP, Estrada Poznańska, City of Poznań

edition 2023

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Poznań Art Week

PAW is an art festival inaugurated in 2017 in the capital of Wielkopolska in order to create a joint cultural program of public and private institutions operating in the field of visual arts.