Ostrzę (The Blade)

Mixed media photographic collage on cradled wood panel.

23x36x2"

Through the Retrieval series, I work against the inherited iconography of medieval stained glass, recovering the feminine presence it was built to suppress. Each piece layers my own photography — shot across locations in France — with archival materials, returning the stained glass form to what it was shaped to obscure: women not as symbol or margin, but as origin. These are not reconstructions of a lost past. They are retrievals — what cultural memory would hold if it had never been severed from its source.

In this piece, I wanted to reconstruct a window based on the Arthurian myth of the Lady In the Lake. In traditional storytelling and iconography, the passive woman provides the sword to the king. Instead, I reworked the imagery so that she is the sword, the power, the force from which only a true leader could draw. I also layered in the triple goddess motif to honour the old one Hekate and my Polish heritage (matryoshka). Finally, I chose stark background photography to create a sense of the old faith and ancient power of women.