Berlin – Warsaw – Mumbai: Two continents, three metropolitan cities, a million dreams. The megacity scintillates. Its promise and illusions form the point of departure for the international project “The Promised City”. Two years ago the Polish Institute Berlin and the Goethe-Institut in Warsaw and Mumbai - invited famous curators, intellectuals and artists to join in a collaborative process of research and work.

What is it that makes today’s cities so different, so appealing?
Is it the money, the freedom of being anonymous, the wealth of forms and attractions, the unlimited possibilities to succeed or fail? Young photographers from Berlin, Warsaw and Mumbai have followed the trails of fortune seekers in these three metropolises. In each city a different, specific aspect was examined.

Crossing by Katarzyna kalua Krynska is a series of photographs, which were taken in the Shelter-home for Underage and Penitentiary Institution for girls aged 13-21 years in Warsaw, Falenica. This closed institution with rigid order is established as educational and therapeutic support center for underage girls with difficult past.

In the reformatory, each of the girls is trying to build up her own private piece of the world. In the rooms, common areas such as dining room or in the backyard they spend their leisure time and learn to perform their tasks. The yard space separated by a high fence as well as the window bars do not allow us to forget in what kind of a place we are. Bed area is dominated by souvenirs, posters, postcards, pictures of families or friends - a sort of kaleidoscope of emotions that accompany this place. Here their paths are crossed, experiences, secrets and family dramas.


Artistic Direction: Armin Smailovic, Werner Mahler
A production of the Goethe-Institut Warsaw and Mumbai and the Ostkreuzschule für Fotografie Berlin in co-operation with the Polish Institute in Berlin

Berlin
Gallery in Willy-Brandt-Haus
Wilhelmstraße 140/Stresemannstraße 28
14.04.–09.05.2010

Warsaw
Centrum Działań Twórczych 1500 m2
ul. Solec 18
22.05-12.06.2010

Mumbai
Galeria Project 88
BMP Building, N.A. Sawant Marg
October 2010

Image:
© Katarzyna kalua Krynska, 2009
www.kalua.pl