Traces of Gdansk on the route of the City Signs of Culture

Agnieszka Tokarska (City of Gdansk): Where did you get the idea for the City Signs of Culture project?
Szymon Wróblewski: It developed from the experience we gained in Plama club. For years, the club has been carrying out many projects in the public space: The FETA Street and Open-Air Theatres Festival, the Music Among the Tower Blocks series of rooftop concerts, Images Painted with Fire... Each of these projects enriches the city with a certain kind of art: theatre, music, visual arts.

A.T.: The award committee focused mainly on the idea to develop an on-line base of Gdansk murals at www.miejskieznakikultury.pl. In what direction will on-line base develop?
Sz.W.: The web-site and the project itself, first and foremost promote a new way of thinking about our city, about making art in the public space. A city, for me, is on the one hand a developed creation, but on the other hand also something that is constantly developing. Developed, as certain elements have merged together so much that we have ceased to notice them. Developing, as I can still see there a place for, say, the City Signs of Culture - a series of commentaries on the surroundings, interwoven with the cityscape. A City Signs of Culture is closely and permanently tied to the space that surrounds it. Just like Galeria Wrzeszcz, which says that the "gallery" is nor the shopping centre which was built nearby, or the John Paul II and Lech Walesa mural, which is a memento of the Mass held in Zaspa, in 1987. An City Signs of Culture bonds together two elements: the developed city we find and the developing city which we create today.

A.T.: The CSC on-line base includes works by the artists of the Monumental Art Festival. Will then the CSC project focus only on murals or will it include works from other street-art genres?
Sz.W.: It is an open project. It pursues artists, who most of all are ready to get to know the city, to anchor their work in the city-scape, so that it "becomes intimate" with the city, so the viewer forgets how a certain element of this cityscape looked like before the image was made. It's true that today the City Signs of Culture are mainly murals...It's the clearest form of spreading ideas. However, this does not close the door to sculptors, theatre artists, or even musicians.

A.T.: Do you think that Gdansk has a chance to become Poland's street-art centre?
Sz.W.: I think that Gdansk really can become Poland's street-art centre and it's my role to make sure that this street-art isn't just a painting on a free wall, painted wherever, only that it complements the city, that it is a comment, that it turns the viewer to the place's history and function, that says more about the city.

A.T.: One of the ideas behind the creation of the CSC on-line base was to promote alternative routes of touring the city. Could you giv e us an overview of your most interesting proposals?
Sz.W.: Your first point in touring the city should be the purchase of an all-day ticket for SKM Rapid Urban Rail. The second step is to choose a train stop: Gdansk Stocznia will lead us to The Shipyard by Iwona Zajac, Gdansk Politechnika has Kliniczna Junction nearby, Gdansk Wrzeszcz means Galeria Wrzeszcz, Gdansk Zaspa greets us with colourful benches and a monumental gallery you can see already from the train platform... Don't be afraid to go further, go into the estate and get lost among the thirty-metre paintings. Those who are hungry for information about art in public spaces can find a helping hand in us, the staff of Club Plama, which is located precisely in Gdansk's Zaspa district, the European District of Culture.