Hobby Horse 🐴 🐴

bronze sculptures

In the performance, the author refers to the connoted symbols that the figure of the horse in European culture for centuries. Represented at a gallop, they carried emperors towards victory and were a symbol of strength and toxic masculinity.

The props used in the performance come from the sport of Hobby Horse in which competitors in a race ride toy horses on a stick. The name of this sport and the word „hobby” originated from medieval England and is associated with a man who. Hoblers or Hovellers were men who held a horse buck to give immediate information about the threat of invasion. Their duty was to reconnoitre, carry information, spy, or pursue fugitives.

The performing men, during the performance, instead of moving gracefully, made increasingly twisted and slower movements. Thus, the artist’s intention was to ridicule an invader with imperial inclinations.

Performers at work strike elements of the memorial to the Polish Tu-154 crash in Smolensk, which never stood in Smolensk (Russia) – to commemorate the dead due to lack of permission from the Russian authorities.

Text: Stanisław Małecki
10th Young Triennale: Consolidation / X Трієнале Молодого Мистецтва: Утривалення, Center of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko
Curated by Stanisław Małecki, Lia Dostlieva, Andrii Dostliev
Pictures by Ewa Szatybelko

Perfomance by Waldemar Tatarczuk, Mateusz Wszelaki
Sound by Waldemar Tatarczuk

bronze h: 140 cm

The installation uses works by artists Plamen Bratanov, Centaur- 1980s,
Bronislaw Chromy, Horse- war memory 1954,
Anna Debska, Romping Foal 1990.