Info
Poland’s first institution working at the intersection of contemporary art, media and communication.
Our original exhibition, educational, research and publication programs are based on experimental arts and organization practices.
Culminating in Polish and international projects, they showcase the creative potential of new technologies and explore the innovative relationships of image, sound and perception in the context of contemporary art and cultural reflection.
Our programs reach out to a broad public interested in new languages of art.
The WRO Art Center, largely financed from the public resources and EU funds, is an independent institution and a public benefit organization.
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Team
Viola Krajewska
director
Piotr Krajewski
chief curator
artistic director of the WRO Biennale
Zbigniew Kupisz
chief producer
Paweł Janicki
R&D / Lab
Dominika Kluszczyk
project manager, producer
Klio Krajewska
project manager
Dagmara Domagała, Zuzanna Jaworska
WRO Archive and project coordinator
Mariia Serhiienko
media, communication
Nari Kutlubasis
editor
Kinga Gralak
graphic design
Julia Czerwińska, Vitalina Magomedova, Małgorzata Wrzosek, Tola Kita
Sundays with WRO
Michał Szota
webmaster
Mira Boczniowicz
video
Jan Dorawa, Bożena Horodniczy
accountancy
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The WRO Art Center was opened in 2008 by the WRO Center for Media Art Foundation – an independent organization specializing in the areas where contemporary art and culture intersect with developing media. The WRO Art Center, which is supported by the Wrocław Municipal Authorities, is located at Widok 7 (the View St.), in a building that’s partly newly built and partly a renovated historical site: the first electric coffee-roasting plant in Europe – the Otto Stiebler Kaffee Rösterei – opened here in the 90s of the 19th century.
The WRO Art Center’s mission includes organizing exhibitions, screenings, lectures and workshops, and developing projects that encompass art, publishing, education and publicity – all in the realm of contemporary art. The Center’s activities are aimed at a diverse audience: art and media professionals as well as the general public, including children and teenagers. The aim of this multifaceted program is to support art and education, and to promote open international cultural and intellectual discussion via the WRO Media Art Biennale, through the expansion of the highly accessible WRO media archives, through the Center’s collaboration with international art institutions and galleries, and by running an international residency program for artists and curators.
All forms of presentations take place in both regular locations, i.e. at Widok 7 and at Kuźnicza 29a (WRO Atelier), as well as in the closest neighborhood of the gallery, i.e. the space on the square in front of the entrance between the streets of Widok and Mennicza, and are free for visitors.
Exhibitions that have been held at the WRO Art Center include: Mirosław Bałka Jetzt, Igor Krenz Illegal Practices, Andrzej Dudek-Dürer Mental Steps, Andrzej Paluchiewicz My Grotowski, Witkacy Psychoholism, Wolf Kahlen Video Tapes, Edward Zajec Orphics, Tibor Szemzö Invisible Story, Robert Cahen Chopinpiano, Tomasz Domański Middle Age, Carolee Schneemann Lifebook or Istvan Kantor Media Revolt, Distinguishing Features and Interactive Playground. WRO has also originated and organized numerous exhibitions held at other venues, including Hidden Decade: Polish Video Art 1985-95, shown among others at the National Museum in Wrocław and the Art Bunker in Kraków, Where’s Chopin exhibition of concert-playing installations, which debuted simulataneously at the 2010 Warsaw Autumn Festival in Warsaw and at the Dilston Grove gallery in London, and Der Stand der Bilder – Medienpionieren Zbigniew Rybczyński und Gábor Bódy, at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin and ZKM | Karlsruhe.
The WRO Art Center in Wrocław, Poland, which opened its new site in February 2008, shares much of its history with the WRO new-media festivals. From their inception in 1989, the WRO festivals have been dedicated to audiovisual art created using electronic media. Besides the obvious allusion to the city in which the festival is held, the name WRO was short for Wizualnych Realizacji Okołomuzycznych – “sound basis visual art”. This conveyed the festival’s goal of presenting the latest audiovisual works created using new media. In the late ’80s and early ’90s the use of the synergistic creative potential of audiovisual forms was one of the primary characteristics of new electronic art. Since 1993 the WRO festivals have been held every two years, and in 1995 their name was changes to the WRO Media Art Biennale. In this broader format, audiovisual forms are complemented by explorations of the creative and communicative potentials of new media, and their significance in cultural and social change. The WRO Media Art Biennale features an international competition, along with special exhibitions and programs overseen by guest curators, performances and topical conferences, such as WRO 97 Geo/InfoTerritory, WRO2000@kultura, WRO 03 Globalica, WRO 05, WRO 09 Expanded City, WRO 2011 Alternative Now, WRO 2013 Pioneering Values, WRO 2015 Test Exposure.
The WRO Art Center, in addition to its steady program of national and international exhibitions, educational activities and publishing endeavors (including the Polish/English multimedia periodical WIDOK: The WRO Media Art Reader), is currently developing unique international multidisciplinary projects both in contemporary art and in other cultural contexts. WRO is also actively involved in organizing international residencies and exhibitions for artists working with new technologies and innovative approaches to image, sound and perception.
The WRO Art Center was founded by Piotr Krajewski, Violetta Kutlubasis-Krajewska and Zbigniew Kupisz.
WRO Foundation
The WRO Art Center was opened in 2008 by the WRO Center for Media Art Foundation
The Foundation is a Public Benefit Organisation
Board of the Foundation
Piotr Krajewski, president of the Foundation
Violetta Kutlubasis-Krajewska, member of the Board
Zbigniew Kupisz, member of the Board
Council of the Foundation
Information
WRO Center for Media Art Foundation
Kuźnicza 29a
50-138 Wroclaw, Poland
National ID [NIP]: 897-15-80-903
WRO Atelier
WRO Atelier is the seat of the WRO Center for Media Art Foundation. For a decade, there have been the organizational offices of the international WRO Media Art Biennale, an extensive archive of the Biennale works and documentations, and the digitization laboratory; currently, the space serves as a workroom / studio for artists participating in residency programs, a library and a place for classes with students of Art Mediation.
The WRO Foundation has Poland’s most extensive and one of the largest in Europe collection of media works by artists from all over the world. Many years’ activities of WRO (since 1989) have turned Wroclaw to the “capital of new media” in this part of Europe.
WRO’s collection is systematically elaborated and made available to the public in the WRO Art Center’s Media Library.
Volunteers/Interns
Are you looking for a volunteer position or want to make an internship in the arts? Are you passionate about contemporary art, new media, video, and performance? Become a WRO Art Center volunteer or an intern!
Volunteer/Intern position at WRO gives you an opportunity to gain experience in institutional organization, production and promotion of artistic events and projects, and a chance to meet many interesting people both on national and international levels.
Benefits of becoming a WRO Art Center volunteer/intern include free entrance to all events organized by WRO and individual access to our archive with a substantial collection of materials on contemporary and media art i.e. video art, interactive art, performance art, net art, computer animation etc.
Volunteers’/Interns’ activities comprise of:
– day-to-day tasks in maintaining the exhibitions
– administrative support
– help with text edition and translation
– help with promotion activities (design and distribution of materials)
If this is of interest to you, please send your application including CV to: wolontariat@wrocenter.pl.
Volunteer/Intern work is not financially beneficial. We also cannot provide accommodation nor grant scholarships.