Companion: Małgorzata Mirga-Tas and Sráč Sam in Dialogue at Galerie Lázně Liberec
The exhibition Companion brings together Polish Roma artist Małgorzata Mirga-Tas and Czech artist Sráč Sam in a dialogue exploring textiles, memory, identity and women’s experiences. Presented at Galerie Lázně Liberec in the Czech Republic, the project examines how artistic practices can connect personal stories with collective histories and make overlooked experiences visible.
Curated by Tea Kříž, the exhibition explores the many meanings textiles can carry: from material traces of everyday life to expressions of belonging, care and resistance. Although the two artists approach their work from different perspectives, both engage with questions of how people relate to one another and how identities and memories take shape through lived experience.
Małgorzata Mirga-Tas is internationally recognised for her large-scale textile compositions, which incorporate found fabrics and clothing to tell stories of Roma communities, everyday life and cultural memory. Her work challenges stereotypical representations of Roma people by placing their experiences, relationships and histories at the centre of the image. Czech artist Sráč Sam works across different media, including drawing, text, architecture and performative formats. In Companion, questions of space, shelter and human relationships enter into dialogue with Mirga-Tas’s textile-based practice.
The exhibition is also closely connected to the history of the Liberec region, where textile production has played a significant role in shaping the local economy, landscape and social life. As this industrial heritage changes and disappears, Companion invites visitors to consider textiles as more than material objects: they can preserve memories of work, family, community and women’s lives, while offering ways to reflect on identity and social change.
The curatorial concept draws inspiration from feminist thinker Silvia Federici’s Re-enchanting the World and the memoir of Romani writer Elena Lacková, Born Under a Lucky Star. These references bring feminist perspectives and Romani lived experience into conversation, opening up questions about whose histories are remembered, whose voices are heard and how art can create space for alternative narratives.
Timea Junghaus, curator and art historian, has also contributed a text to the exhibition catalogue.
The exhibition opens on 16 October 2026, with the public exhibition running from 17 October 2026 to 28 March 2027 at Galerie Lázně Liberec.
Exhibition: Małgorzata Mirga-Tas, Sráč Sam | Companion
Curator: Tea Kříž
Venue: Galerie Lázně Liberec, Masarykova 723/14, Liberec, Czech Republic
Dates: 17 October 2026 – 28 March 2027
More information: https://www.galali.cz/en/event/malgorzata-mirga-tas-a-sam-srac-or-companion
