The exhibition “In the Middle Lane, the Grass Was Tall in the Summer” opens with the installation “In the Warm air between the fingers”, whose elongated form unfolds like a motorway. This association is reinforced by the rhythm created by the metal frame and the yellow fabric stretched over it, forming a sequence extended in space like a road. Inspired by accounts of picnics on the middle lane, the artist reaches for wool – folding like a blanket spread on the grass. It was dyed by hand by the artist using natural pigments derived from tansy, St John’s wort and chamomile, plants growing along the motorway verges. In this work, the A4 changes scale. It ceases to be overwhelming and comes closer to the body – to lying down, resting, touch. Concrete gives way to the softness of fabric. The title refers to air flowing between the fingers of a hand extended out of a car window on a warm summer day – a fleeting, sensory experience.

Agata Ciastoń, curator

The work was created especially for the exhibition “In the Middle Lane, the Grass Was Tall in the Summer” – a multifaceted story about the transformations that the Lower Silesian section of the A4 motorway has undergone over nearly a hundred years. It is a story not only of infrastructural change, but above all of political, social, and landscape transformations, in which the Polish and German histories of this important artery intertwine.