Sleeping and Vigilance is the first comprehensive presentation of Karolina Jabłońska’s pandemic-era paintings, created during the lockdowns of 2020. Now, five years later, these works—scattered across private collections—return to a shared space, allowing viewers to once again confront the emotions and experiences of global isolation. The exhibition, organized in collaboration with the Collectors Foundation, will be on view starting June 13, 2025, at Krupa Art Foundation.

A Collector’s Initiative and a New Palette of Emotions

The exhibition was initiated by collector Tomasz Pasiek, founder of a new art space on the Warsaw map—the Collectors Foundation. Believing that five years offers enough distance to revisit pandemic life not through the lens of trauma, but of reflection, he launched a project that explores this period from a fresh perspective. During this time, Karolina Jabłońska—known for her expressive and ironic painterly language—dramatically shifted her color palette: the fleshy pinks and saturated reds gave way to cool blues, navy tones, and greys.

Everyday Life Under a Microscope

Sleeping and Vigilance is an exhibition about suspended time—about stillness, insomnia, and emotional drift. Repeating scenes—a figure tossing and turning in bed, a woman overwhelmed by objects, a home that gradually transforms into a storage space for things and emotions—form a cohesive narrative about confinement, fear, and solitude. Jabłońska portrays a world where the home ceases to be a sanctuary and becomes a space saturated with unease.

Grotesque as a Survival Strategy

Although these paintings were created during the events of 2020, they are far from being a straightforward chronicle of the moment. The artist transforms the pandemic experience into a universal visual language, balancing between drama and grotesque. Her work is marked by both detachment and humor, as well as a deeply human attempt to cope with crisis. Her characteristic exaggeration—bordering on hyperbole—becomes a tool for diagnosing the collective psychological state.

Paintings as a Diary of an Era

At a time when galleries and museums were closed, Jabłońska’s works quickly entered private collections—not just as investments, but as emotional mirrors of the era. Now, gathered in one place, they form a visual journal of a time we are only beginning to understand.

Between Dream and the Present

Sleeping and Vigilance is not just an exhibition—it is a shared look into the past, before we completely seal it in the archive of memory. It is an invitation to pause, just for a moment, between dreaming and waking, between recollection and the present.

Exhibition partners:
Collectors Foundation
Raster Gallery

The exhibition will also be presented in autumn 2025 in Warsaw, at the headquarters of the Collectors Foundation—a newly established institution dedicated to promoting contemporary art, supporting current artists, and advancing the idea of collecting. The Foundation aims to make private collections accessible to the public and to provide educational programming.