The Winter Rite of Marzanna, 2025
Effigy building workshop, parade & exhibition
Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Art, Kraków, Poland
I led a workshop for Professor Joanna Kaiser and Dr. Anna Rakoczy’s Drawing 1 students in December. Students were instructed to interpret the story of Marzanna in their own way, highlighting the powerful rein of the Goddess over the wintertime. We paraded around the Wawel Castle, guided by the saxophone song of Aleksander Kwietniak, to the replica of the Zbruch Idol - a 9th century limestone pagan idol. We placed our marzannas on the fallen tree beside the idol, and at the base of the idol, we lit lanterns and planted flower seeds in the name of two mythic water women: Marzanna and Queen Wanda (who drowned herself in the Wisła River to avoid marrying a suitor).
