Rapunzel

photo: Małgorzata Kujda

[…] An alternative vision, in which architecture bears the hallmarks of a living being, is proposed by Karolina Balcer in her work Rapunzel. Created from blinds discovered in a hospital room, the installation triggers associations with the long hair of the eponymous heroine, conjuring up a fantasy vision of the building as a living organism. The artist makes use of the phenomenon of pareidolia. i.e. perceiving familiar, mostly anthropomorphic shapes in random details, which indicates not only the conventionality of perception, but also the difficulty of adopting a non-anthropocentric point of view. At the same time, Balcer’s installation can be treated as an example of working through modernism and art history by making a reference to the traditions of post-minimalism and the readymade. Such diverse interpretations resulting from the adoption of different methodologies and cognitive perspectives indicate the non-homogeneous character of the contemporary humanities, full of mutually exclusive narratives and often incompatible cultural theories. […]

Małgorzata Miśniakiewicz: Concealed. In: Art Reviev SURVIVAL 17. Catalogue, Wrocław 2019, p. 52-53.