Centre for Creative Practices in collaboration with the Polish Arts Festival present
HOMO FABER
Myths and Turning Points
Multidisciplinary installation by
Kleszczewski & Zimnoch, Zimnoch & Kleszczewski
Wrestling with the development trap from primordial fire to the digital age
The Hunt Museum, Limerick
6 – 16 September 2025
Opening & Artist Talkstling
Saturday, 6 September | 2–5 pm
Supported by: Arts Council · CFCP · PAF · The Hunt Museum
We stood face to face with civilization for a long time, believing progress could change the bad DEAL forced upon us by GOD. One of us – or rather a PRE-HUMAN – discovered time and death when he threw clay into the fire. He realized he too could shape matter. From that moment, Homo Faber fell into a trap: condemned to ceaseless labour, loving blacksmithing, alchemy, physics, architecture, medicine. The more he strove, the more he punished himself – paying with his life to conquer time and live forever.
He was St. Augustine, dreaming of HEAVEN on earth.
He was Nimrod, building a CITY that would reach the sky.
The punishment was forgetting the UHRSPRACHE, the primordial link to God and to one another. From then on: migration, interpretation, exile.
Something like a moss-quilt lies amid a radioactive landscape. Beneath, a thin stream carries a trace of green light, ending in a rusted barrier. A black dog finds the fallen man. Nature devours the DECAY left behind by HUMANS and ALIENS.
Is AI the inverted Tower of Babel?
Has Homo Faber finally found a way to reverse
the EVIL SPELL cast by God?
Or is this the end of Homo Faber? LEVEL UP?
Homo Faber filled the world with his creations. The earth is layered with
fragments of his objects – important, unimportant, dear to the heart.
Terracotta armies lie down to sleep forever. Broken swords sink beneath
plastic that now flows in our blood, altering the chains of life.
I saw a plague, and I saw wars on the internet.
I saw the breakthrough of 1989 in western Poland.
I walked to school in Szczecin, the city Stalin gifted to Poland.
I saw Russians selling everything on the marketplace.
I smelled the Amiga 500+ fresh from its box.
I watched my parents play Wings of Fury on glowing joysticks.
I kept a PET bottle, brought by my uncle from another world.
I drank my first Coca-Cola from a can at the border in Kołbaskowo.
I remember the 1990s, and I will never stop loving the objects that flooded us like a deluge, drowning our complexes in happiness.
I remember the protests when the largest shipyard on the Baltic was shut down.
“(…) I saw things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.”
I leave you this kunstkamera,
because what I remember – you have seen,
and what you remember – I have seen.
Konik Studio
Kasia Zimnoch and Paweł Kleszczewski are a duo of visual artists, curators, and filmmakers whose practice intertwines contemporary art, animation, and experimental exhibition-making. Graduates of the Faculty of Fine Arts at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, they founded Konik Studio in 2013 in Cavan, Ireland, later relocating its activity to Poland after
seven years.
Their work has been presented at over one hundred international film festivals and art exhibitions receiving awards and critical recognition. Zimnoch and Kleszczewski’s films and installations often weave together folklore, myth, and contemporary narratives, creating immersive worlds where painting, moving image, and performance overlap. As curators, they experiment with exhibition formats, approaching the gallery space as a living “kunstkammer” — a cabinet of curiosities where images, objects, and sounds converse beyond traditional hierarchies.
They have participated in international residencies in Ireland, Sweden, Estonia, and Germany
Centre for Creative Practices
(CFCP0 is an award-winning, not-for-profit development and resource organisation for migrant & culturally diverse artists in Ireland. Migrant-centred and migrant-led, CFCP is acknowledged as a pioneer and catalyst for promoting cultural diversity, intercultural collaboration and exchange. Connecting creative talent from diverse communities and social groups and helping them to become agents of cultural and social developments, CFCP provides a new model for integration.
CFCP is committed to professionally showcasing works by migrant and culturally diverse artists through curated programmes of multidisciplinary artistic events. CFCP also effectively supports developing the talent of migrant artists by offering tailored capacity-building opportunities, including mentoring, training and providing resources. Finally, CFCP helps artists to access the local arts scene and build professional networks and sustainable careers.
Since its inception in 2009, CFCP has presented over 1,000 multidisciplinary and participatory events, including exhibitions, concerts, performances, readings and screenings, promoting works by over 1,500 artists to over 20,000 audiences.
CFCP is an active member of various European networks of intercultural and socially engaged organisations and subscribes to the values of diversity, tolerance, inclusiveness, respect, care, hospitality and sustainability, which are reflected in our programmes, curatorial approach and day-to-day operations.
CFCP’s yearly flagship project, New Voices of Ireland, presents works by outstanding migrant and culturally diverse artists from Ireland and abroad through themed exhibitions and accompanying multidisciplinary events.
Our annual Meeting Point is a series of talks and workshops led by experts in their field, offering capacity-building opportunities to migrant and culturally diverse artists.
Third Space is a new initiative that brings migrant and local artists together to co-create and collaborate on creative projects.
CFCP also actively researches works by migrant and culturally diverse artists in Ireland, archives the information about these artists and maintains a database on our website www.cfcp.ie.
CFCP is kindly supported by the Arts Council of Ireland and through philanthropic donations.
CFCP was founded and is run by a team of curators and cultural managers, Monika Sapielak and Ian Oliver.
AWARDS:
• Good Causes Award, National Lottery of Ireland, national finalist, regional and county Winner, 2019
• Main Winner of the Arthur Guinness Fund, 2012
• Multicultural Company of the Year, 2011
• Dublin Living Awards – shortlisted for Dublin Gallery of the Year, 2011
• Social Entrepreneurs Ireland, Level 1 Award, 2007
Notes:
(*) Homo Faber – Latin „man the maker”; a philosophical concept describing man as a being who shapes the world through work and the production of tools.
(*) HEAVEN – in this context, a reference to the vision of an earthly paradise, inspired by Christian and utopian concepts.
(*) NIMROD – biblical ruler and builder of the Tower of Babel, a symbol of ambition and human pride.
(*) UHRSPRACHE – German „primordial language”; the idea of a universal language spoken by humanity before the confusion of tongues in the Tower of Babel myth.
(*) DECAY – here: refers to a scene from the film „STALKER” by Andrei Tarkovsky.
(*) Wings of Fury – an arcade computer game from 1989 simulating fighter missions during World War II.
(*) „All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.” – a quote from the film Blade Runner (1982), monologue of the character Roy Batty.
(*) Kunstkamera – an early type of museum of curiosities (cabinet of wonders) popular from the 16th century, collecting unique, rare, and unusual objects for educational and entertainment purposes.
Illustrations:
– Frame from the film „Planet of the Apes” (1968) – dir. Franklin J. Schaffner
– Frame from the film „Stalker” (1979) – dir. Andrei Tarkovsky
– „Tatlin’s Tower” – design for the Monument to the Third International, Vladimir Tatlin, 1919–1920
– Frame from the film „Blade Runner 2049” (2017) – dir. Denis Villeneuve
– Turzyn marketplace, Szczecin, 1990s
– Frame from the film „Blade Runner” (1982) – dir. Ridley Scott
