Works

Metopia (2022), Performance/Installation

“Martyna Pekala’s performance Metopia is a reflection of the process of creating and maintaining an online presence on social media. Heavily influenced by internet culture and aesthetics, nineties children’s toys and social media, Pekala’s performance piece plays with the fabrication of the self-image.

Inspired by platform games in which you can dress up your own virtual doll, Pekala created a doll out of herself, objectifying her own appearance. Similarly dressing up her performers like dolls, using a blindfold or wooden box with her own face on it, she takes on the role of a puppeteer. The performers costumes suggest that they are the physicalized versions of Pekala’s virtual avatar, a digital reference to the self. But she is not physically there, and the performers become live sculptures, frozen in one pose, making the viewer question whether they are real people and if the artist is present.”

Text by Milou Terpstra

Metopia for Melkweg, Amsterdam (August 2022)
Exhibition “Graduation Show” curated by Colette Olof
Photography by Lotte Spek