Jaśmina Wójcik

Jaśmina Wójcik is a visual artist, director and author of listening-focused, participatory socio-artistic actions based in Warsaw, Poland. In her work, she is passionate about including and lending subjectivity to communities that lack visibility and expression. She is co-editor of the book Art with the Community (2018) centered around her best-known work – a long-term project with a community of former workers of a factory in Ursus (Warsaw/Poland), which culminated in the creation of an award-winning creative documentary film she directed, entitled Symphony of the Ursus Factory (2018). For several years, she has been involved in alternative education through the development of proprietary practices in the creation of children’s artistic expression. She gives agency and subjectivity to children, treating them as co-creators and inviting them to participate in dialogue. Wójcik is currently focusing predominantly on grassroots education practices, which will result in her new film based on the novel by educator Janusz Korczak, King Matt the First.

She coordinates Gazeta Dzieci (The Children’s Newspaper) which is a place for children’s authentic expression created by children for children. Wójcik is responsible for the organizational side of the process (space, promotion, partnerships, printing). Gazeta Dzieci’s overriding goal is to put children in charge, fostering in them an awareness that their voices are important.

Jaśmina Wójcik believes that artists should be responsible for their own social environment and that art (just like education) has the power to change reality, but, more importantly, that it has the power to change us, too.