I am Zofia nierodzińska, I was born in 1985 in Łomża, a medium-sized town in Podlasie in eastern Poland, as my mother's second or third child: I have a twin sister and it is unclear which of us was born first. In the spring of 1985, Poland was still one of the socialist countries and no one could have predicted that in four years the communist system would collapse and that we would have to adjust our life realities to the rules of capitalism at an accelerated pace. Between 2000 and 2005, I attended an art high school in Nałęczów. I then studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań. I painted mainly figures of young people whose gender was not clearly defined. I read Judith Butler's 'Gender Trouble... ', just translated into Polish by Krytyka Polityczna, and tried to understand my situation as a female person in a strictly Catholic, turbo-capitalist post-Soviet society at the beginning of the 21st century.
After graduating from the academy in Poznan, ending a four-year relationship and winning a prize in a 'young Polish artists' competition, I moved to Berlin. I studied, partying and trying to survive. I learned German and got into the MA Art in Context at the University of Arts in Berlin, graduating in 2016 with the thesis 'Materiality of Work, an Assemblage, a Brick, a Piece of Cake', in which I compared and contrasted the work I made for money in a patisserie and the one I made for symbolic reasons at an art university, for which I received credit points instead of money. Before that, I was working on a "Spargelhof" next to Berlin and researching the conditions of work of Polish migrants there. I was doing activism as a member of the Auntie Basia (Ciocia Basia) collective for reproductive justice and working on a Ph.D entitled 'Where is the Academy? Critical Institution and Science Fiction, Towards The Virtual Feminist University', which I completed in 2017 at the University of Arts in Poznan.
Just when I thought my life would forever be linked to Neukölln (Berlin), I got a job as deputy director of the Municipal Gallery Arsenal in Poznan. I moved back to Poznan and during my five and a half years at the gallery, I co-curated seven exhibitions, quite a few events, co-edited three books and a platform on art and activism called Magazyn RTV. I continued to be involved in activism, and after the Women's Strike for Reproductive Justice in 2020, I was subjected to constant repression by the Church and the Polish state. After being convicted of "offending the religious feelings" of some high-ranking officials of the Catholic Church, I moved back to Berlin, where I have been living with my partner and a doggy since June 2022.
In 2022 I have received a research scholarship from the Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Europa for the publication "Politics of (In)Accessibility" and in 2023 a research grant from Goethe-Institut for a one-month stay in Ljubljana at the Igor Zabel's archive, I was also invited to a research visit to Kyiv implemented by Insha Osvita and sponsored by Prague Civil Society Centre. Between January and June 2023 I was working as a co-editor of the Theatertreffen-Blog and curator of the programme for young cultural critics.
The 'Politics of (In)Accessibility' on disabilities and accessibility in CEE was published in October 2023.
Between 2023 and 2024 I was working together with Katharina Koch and Sylvia Sadzinski on a residency-gathering project "Geographies of Collectivity. Artistic Infrastructures in Times of Crises: Berlin-Vienna-Graz-Minsk-Kharkiv-Pristina" at alpha nova&galerie futura in Berlin; and on the exhibition on economic migration and its personal implications "Fernbeziehungen (Long-distance Relationships)" at the KVOST in Berlin and at Galeria Łęctwo in Poznań.
As a painter in February 2024 I took part in the exhibition with Patryk Różycki at the Galeria WY in Łódź with the title "Far Away From Here" and in the exhibit "Fernbeziehungen (Long-distance Relationships)" at the KVOST.
Since March 2024 I have been teaching as a lecturer at the Academy of Fine Arts in Szczecin in the Faculty of: Curatorial Studies and Exhibition Making.
I am a member of AICA , n-ost, bbk berlin, and the nGbK.
