BMO Harris Bank Chicago Works: Ania Jaworska

There are two projects showing in the exhibition right now; there are sculptures and prints, and I feel that those are absolutely complete works, but also they function as models and plans, proposals.

I think there’s more layers to it. It’s not only sculpture, it’s not only a proposal . . . I was really trying to explore with this project on how to take common architectural forms and limit them to the minimum, just take things out until they become the purest kind of form possible that still expresses things and still brings the references.

Gated Area is thinking about a form that is very strong in architecture. And I think it lets you in, but also you have a certain border that you actually have to respect.

With Monument For Them or Sign of Their Place, “hi,” for example, is a very direct message. It really represents the need to communicate through a built environment. Same with “here.” It's about place making, or signifying a place.

Subjective Catalogue of Columns is a way of research, a way of collecting elements, or collecting forms, in order to start to talk about culture and architecture at large. Each of the columns in the catalogue, they represent ideas that are very specific to the architecture community, or something that is very familiar. And I think by doing this I try to flatten the hierarchy between architecture and popular culture and put them together into one catalogue, under one roof.

The exhibition allowed me to continue thinking about how I want to approach the practice or have a conversation with the larger architecture practice. I can see life beyond this exhibition.