The exhibition entitled ‘The Warsaw Tigers, The Power of the Team’, which opened on the 10th December 2014 at the Museum Of Contemporary Art in Skopje, Macedonia, concerns the work of the Polish architectural group ‘Tigers’, comprising the collaboration between the three architects W.Khyszewski, J.Mokrzunski and E.Wierzbicki. Widely considered as being among the most significant and prolific modernist Polish architects, they are also the authors of the competition-winning project for the Museum Of Contemporary Art in Skopje itself, one of the finest examples of 20th century modernism in Macedonia, and a much loved building in Skopje.
The circumstances of the realization of this important building, as a gift by the Polish government as a gesture of support and international solidarity in the immediate aftermath of the city’s post-earthquake period, further enhances the building’s symbolic significance. The museum’s position on the top of the Kale hillside, high above the city – at once dominating it with its pristine presence and visibility from all around, while overlooking the entire city – places the building in a central position in the city’s (cultural) landscape, as well as within the collective memory of its citizens. At the same time, the museum’s key role as a national cultural institution has likewise been acknowledged by the recent renovation of the building, completed in time for the celebration of fifty years since the museum’s foundation.
All of the above factors contribute to the importance of the current exhibition of the work of the Tigers, itself held within one of their most appraised buildings – the Museum Of Contemporary Art in Skopje – to coincide with the aforementioned celebration of the museum’s 50th anniversary. In this context, and especially at a time when the city’s significant heritage of modern architecture, is to a large extent being discredited within the current political climate, we, as Serious Interests Agency, have been honored to be involved in an exhibition which showcases the talent of the Polish architectural collaborative team ‘The Tigers’, while highlighting the qualities of one of their main works, the Museum Of Contemporary Art in Skopje, Macedonia.
The current exhibition is based on the original exhibition held in Warsaw earlier this year in May ‘The Warsaw Tigers, The Power of the Team’, prepared by ZAIKS, the Polish Association of Authors. The exhibition included a more or less equally weighted representation of nine projects by the Tigers, one of which was the project for the NI MoCA Skopje itself. For the Skopje version of the exhibition, a significant amount of new material has been added to the original exhibition, focusing on the NI Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje – widely considered as one of the tiger’s greatest achievements.
