The Graphic Arts Biennale, established in 1999, is a cyclical review/competition presenting the works of young-generation artists working in the area of graphic arts. In 2019, the competition formula was changed as thematic areas were defined to expose alternative values entering into dialogue with contemporary culture and everyday life. The new formula of the Biennale has been adapted to changes in contemporary art related to post-artistic activities (1:1 art, ‘utilitarian’ art and material realism) and to transformations conditioned by the role of graphic statements in the context of social activities (activist movements).
IMPORT/EXPORT is the theme of the 14th Graphic Arts Biennale, which will take place in Poznań in the spring of 2025. It refers to the hierarchy of dependencies between core countries and the periphery that lead to cultural self-colonization and perpetuate this division of the world. Here, import and export allude to the exchange of culture-forming artistic phenomena.
The expanding global capitalist system creates a network of supranational connections, shaping the binary division of the world into the dominant core and the subordinated periphery. Areas in which civilizational and economic development does not keep up with the pace of the core are still influenced by outdated (archaic) forms of socio-economic organization. The slower paced development of the periphery is often explained by its insufficient integration with more economically advanced areas. However, we fail to observe that it is the global economic system, which is based on the accumulation of capital, that contributes to the emergence of this division and of backward regions, which are a ‘consequence of the polarising logic of the expansion of this system’.
The import and export of culture-forming artistic phenomena in the horizontal model support socialization while sustaining diversity, which makes it possible to show the complex human environment more thoroughly. This model of exchange is not limited to ‘products’ (which is typical of consumer culture) but focuses on active participation in a creative process and on searching for and propagating utopian visions.