Maria Jarema and Maria Pinińska-Bereś: Two Monographic Exhibitions in Germany

Maria Jarema and Maria Pinińska-Bereś, the most important women artists of 20th-century Polish art, renowned for their groundbreaking sculptures and installations, are back in the spotlight thanks to two monographic exhibitions devoted to their work. “Maria Pinińska-Bereś – Under the Pink Flag” opens at Kunstmuseum Bochum on 24 October 2026 and traces Pinińska-Bereś’s singular path, which combined art with social critique. Meanwhile, Maria Jarema’s work will be shown in Germany for the first time. The exhibition at the Lenbachhaus in Munich opens on 27 October 2026 and offers a comprehensive overview of Jarema’s versatile practice.

Maria Jarema – an artist fighting for the independence of art

“Maria Jarema: Revolutionary Commissar of Abstraction”, a monographic exhibition at the Lenbachhaus in Munich, is the first exhibition devoted to the artist ever held in Germany. The Munich museum will present works from every period of Jarema’s career, including numerous paintings, monotypes, sculptures and costumes. Curated by Stephanie Weber, the exhibition will be on view from 27 October 2026 to 25 April 2027.

Maria Jarema was a multi-talented artist: she sculpted, painted, made prints, designed costumes and sets for dance and theatre productions, and also performed as an actress. She published writings on art and demanded women’s right to self-determination, both in matters of reproductive rights and in their creative work. She criticised socialist realism as a dead art, disconnected from the living experience of reality. She publicly raised the issue of artists’ independence and openly condemned the pressure exerted on them by the communist authorities. For Jarema, art was not a tool of politics but a revolutionary practice, capable of transforming ways of thinking and changing society for the better.

Jarema’s interest in speech, rhythm, movement and bodily expression grew out of her many years of experience in theatre. She sought to translate these forms into sculpture and painting, and to bring the expressive means of these disciplines into theatre. Her monotype series “Rhythms”, “Penetrations” and “Filters” became not only some of her most important works, but also a reflection of her creative method. In her painting, Jarema often entered into dialogue with artists such as Hans Arp and Sophie Taeuber-Arp, André Masson and Jean Hélion. For her, a painting was “a site of confrontation whose effects are felt in the outside world”.

The exhibition partner is the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw. The original curatorial concept for the exhibition “Maria Jarema: Cracked Modernism” was developed by Eric de Chassey and Natalia Sielewicz. The exhibition is organised with the support of the Adam Mickiewicz Institute.

Maria Pinińska-Bereś – a pioneer of Polish feminist art

Kunstmuseum Bochum presents “Maria Pinińska-Bereś – Under the Pink Flag”, an extensive retrospective of one of the most remarkable figures in 20th-century Polish art. The exhibition brings together sculptures, installations and performance documentation spanning five decades of the artist’s work, and will be on view in Bochum from 24 October 2026 to 14 March 2027. The exhibition will be accompanied by curator-led tours and the performance “Living Pink” by Bettina Bereś.

At the heart of Pinińska-Bereś’s practice, at once poetic and political, lies a reflection on femininity and the social constraints associated with it. Subtle, full of humour and eroticism, her art speaks of the complexities of life under an authoritarian system. A sculptor by training, Pinińska-Bereś experimented with the conventions of her discipline from the very beginning: she replaced heavy, traditional materials with papier-mâché, fabric and cotton wool, and expanded sculpture to include performance and actions in public space.

A recurring and distinctive element of her work is the colour pink – often mistakenly perceived as naive or innocent, but in fact deliberately set against the red that was ubiquitous in communist Poland. In Pinińska-Bereś’s work, pink symbolises femininity, the domestic sphere and the body, while also becoming an expression of female self-determination. The exhibition’s title, “Under the Pink Flag”, refers to a series of performances that Maria Pinińska-Bereś staged in nature from 1976 onwards. In them, the artist appeared with a pink flag, and the open landscape became for her a space free from the control of cultural policy.

Curated by Heike Munder, Jarosław Suchan and Julia Lerch-Zajączkowska, the exhibition of Maria Pinińska-Bereś’s work marks the next stage in the artist’s international presence in Europe’s leading exhibition venues. The rapidly growing reception of her work began with an exhibition at the Four Domes Pavilion in Wrocław in 2024. That same year, her work was shown in Leipzig, and in spring 2025 in The Hague. In February 2026, her work was presented at Kunstmuseum Luzern, where it attracted great interest from international audiences and critics.

“Maria Pinińska-Bereś – Under the Pink Flag” is realised in cooperation with Kunstmuseum Luzern. It is co-organised by the Adam Mickiewicz Institute and co-funded by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland. The exhibition is supported by the City of Bochum and the Polish Institute in Düsseldorf.

“Maria Pinińska-Bereś – Under the Pink Flag” – Practical information

• Venue: Kunstmuseum Bochum

• Dates: 24 October 2026 – 14 March 2027

• Curators: Heike Munder, Jarosław Suchan, Julia Lerch-Zajączkowska

• Co-organiser: Adam Mickiewicz Institute

• Partners: Kunstmuseum Luzern, City of Bochum, Polish Institute in Düsseldorf

• Co-funded by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

“Maria Jarema: Revolutionary Commissar of Abstraction” – Practical information

• Venue: Lenbachhaus, Munich

• Dates: 27 October 2026 – 25 April 2027

• Curator: Stephanie Weber

• Partner: Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw

• Organised with the support of the Adam Mickiewicz Institute.