The eighties and the nineties

The emergence of Solidarity (1980) - the only independent trade union in the Communist bloc - and the years of martial law imposed by the Communist authorities, coincided with the tide of post-modernism sweeping over the whole of Western - and that included Polish - culture. And yet the political turning point of 1989, which brought with it the bloodless removal of the Communists and a change to a democratic system with the birth of the Third Republic, in contrast to previous tradition, though it produced certain changes in attitude of the artists did not have much influence on the nature of their art. As the Berlin wall fell and eastern Europe was liberated from the thrall of Communism - in which a key element had been the ten-year long resistance shown by Solidarity - so Polish art, though continuously and independently participating in the shaping of this Polish consciousness of the eighties seemed to stop taking an active interest in the development of political affairs. This is one of the main facets of Polish art in the nineties - which is also dominated by more experienced artists, at the least those of the middle generation whose debuts came in the eighties and whose work is deeply rooted in the traditions of the avant-garde and the neo-avant-garde.