Around the Sea
Art · Science · Communities
Discussion panel accompanying the exhibition
Down deep: Living Seas, Living Bodies
and the exhibition The Feminine Image of the Sea
24 January 2026 | 10:00 a.m. | State Art Gallery in Sopot
The event will be conducted in Polish and English.
Partners: Institute of Oceanology Polish Academy of Sciences, University of Gdańsk, National Marine Fisheries Research Institute
The aim of the meeting is to explore the activities of artists and scientists, cultural institutions, and local communities within the Ocean Decade — a programme proclaimed by the UN and UNESCO five years ago, dedicated, among other things, to ecological, scientific, and artistic initiatives.
“(…) The ocean is not something distant or separate, but something within us — something that connects every living being on this planet. Our exhibition seeks to propose alternatives to the anthropocentric view of human exceptionalism that continues to separate us from our environment and which, throughout history, has forced us to domesticate, categorise, and limit the world around us.”
(Joseph Constable, Curator)
Several dozen artists invited to take part in the Sopot exhibitions turn their attention toward seas and oceans, striking the strings of our imagination, evoking emotions, and inspiring reflection on ecological issues. The destructive effects of overfishing, the loss of numerous animal species, water pollution, and the looming threats linked to the industrial exploitation of deep-sea resources are symptoms of our current relationship with the ocean.
The programme includes two thematic panels devoted to:
- Examples of other exhibitions addressing oceans and ecology
- Collaboration between artists and scientists
Agenda
10:00–10:30 | Guided tour of the exhibition Down deep: Living Seas, Living Bodies
Led by curators Eulalia Domanowska and Joanna Gemes
Participants meet in the gallery space. A half-hour introduction to the exhibition provides context for the subsequent discussions.
10:30–11:30 | Panel I
Artistic perspectives around the sea: examples of exhibitions on oceans and ecology
In addition to the exhibition at the State Art Gallery in Sopot, three further projects dedicated to seas, oceans, and ecology will be presented, offering perspectives from the Helsinki Biennial, the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, and the Baltic Gallery of Contemporary Art.
Moderator:
Eulalia Domanowska — art historian and curator, Director of the State Art Gallery in Sopot
Participants:
- 10:30–10:45 — Kati Kivinen, curator and art historian from Helsinki, HAM Museum, curator of the 2025 edition of the Helsinki Biennial
The theme of this year’s third edition of the Helsinki Biennial, titled Shelter, drew inspiration from the habitat of Vallisaari Island, protected from human settlement for decades. The Biennial reflected the fragile relationship between humanity and the natural world. Moving beyond an anthropocentric perspective, the exhibited artworks foregrounded animals, plants, fungi, insects, and minerals. The Biennial sought to create new spaces of protection and inspire positive environmental action. The 2025 Helsinki Biennial presented 37 artists and collectives from Finland and around the world.
https://helsinkibiennaali.fi/en/hb25/ - 10:45–11:00 — Pandora Syperek, writer and art historian, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, UK — exhibition Sea Inside
Pandora Syperek is a British-Canadian writer and art historian and curator of the exhibition Sea Inside. The exhibition directs our oceanic gaze toward more intimate marine spaces — physical, psychological, and imagined — and delves into shared aquatic origins, Indigenous ways of life, and objects retrieved from the sea and displayed on land.
https://sainsburycentre.ac.uk/channel/sea-inside/ - 11:00–11:15 — Agnieszka Kilian, Director of the Baltic Gallery of Contemporary Art, and Romuald Demidenko, curator — exhibition Water Coalitions
The exhibition Water Coalitions was rooted in place — at the intersection of land and the Baltic Sea. This unique body of water became a starting point for reflecting on modes of coexistence, observing practices drawing from water and its properties, and building relationships between water, body, and community. The exhibition advocated attentiveness, sensitivity to marginalised issues, and phenomena pushed outside social discourse. - 11:15–11:30 — Discussion
11:30–11:45 | Coffee break
11:45–12:45 | Panel II
The idea of artist–scientist collaboration and artistic practices
Participants of the two exhibitions presented at the PGS Gallery, together with scientists from the Institute of Oceanology of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Sopot and the University of Gdańsk, will present artistic practices as an excellent medium for promoting scientific discoveries and theories. The exhibitions are the outcome of the three-year project Marine Planet, which included meetings at PGS and residencies aboard the research vessel Oceania.
The galleries present works by artists who speak about our deep physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual relationship with the ocean. They encourage us to think of the sea as a space of imagination, memory, and transformation.
(Joseph Constable, Curator)
Moderator:
Joanna Gemes — Director and founder of the art consultancy agency l’etrangere, London
- Artists:
Kati Roover | Cecylia Malik | Grażyna Smalej | Kuba Bąkowski | Yan Tomaszewski - Scientists:
Dr hab. Sławomir Sagan, Institute of Oceanology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Sopot
Dr hab. Katarzyna Smolarz, Dean of the Faculty of Oceanography and Geography, University of Gdańsk
Prof. dr hab. Jan Marcin Węsławski, Director of the Institute of Oceanology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Sopot
12:45–13:15 | Audience discussion. Summary
Funding:
Co-financed by the City of Sopot
Co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage from the Culture Promotion Fund — a state earmarked fund
The project In Depth: Living Seas, Living Bodies is supported by the British Council as part of the UK/Poland Season 2025
