The Vistula Water

Przemysław Paliwoda handed out useless objects – bottles containing water from the Vistula. The artist turned the act of giving into an empty gesture. Although he distributed the water for free, he made use of marketing strategies. The bottles tempted with their pristine whiteness, the labels followed the newest solutions in graphic art and resembled those on soft drinks. Thus he created a need to have them, but the consumers received a useless object – the label clearly and coolly communicated that ‘this water is not fit for consumption’. Indeed, there was dirty residue on the bottom. Handing out the Vistula water on the banks of the Oder was an absurd action, but one tinged with politics – marking the Wrocław river with water from the former capital of Poland – Cracow. It resembled marketing efforts to turn the Vistula water into a brand.

> Antoni Burzyński

photo: Peter Kreibich