I Keep Quiet About the Archer

In the performance I Keep Quiet About the Archer, the artist draws upon personal threads: “The archer is my childhood memory. I used to visit my grandfather in the country and, wearing white gymnastics clothing, for some unknown reason I made a bow from a stick and a string. Not caring about comfort, I would run around barefoot with my handmade weapon dangling on my back.” Attired in a way resembling her childhood outfit, the artist shoots at a silhouette target showing a dark outline of a shooting man, with a section mark on his chest. Below there is an inscription: THE LAW DOES NOT DEAL WITH WHAT IS MORAL. This sentence is another reference to the artist’s private story: “It was uttered by a judge who was hearing a case I was involved in. It became embedded in my memory and caused my indignation because it reminded me of the Nuremberg trials, in which the criminals justified their actions by saying that they acted in conformity with the law.” In her performance, Konieczna takes up both the subject of the deeply-rooted need of individuals to fight and self-defend themselves when confronted with a weak, warped and relative law, or its abstract and unhuman dimension, which is often the case.