Press Release

Małgorzata Mirga-Tas is a Romani visual artist, educator and activist. Born in 1978, she lives and works in Czarna Góra, a village at the foot of the Tatra Mountains in southern Poland.

Mirga-Tas is known for her textile collages created with materials and fabrics that are mainly gathered from family and friends. Her visual storytelling comes from a feminist perspective and challenges stereotypical representations of Roma people. Often working in collaboration with other women, she sews pieces of clothing, handkerchiefs, tablecloths, curtains and sheets together to create vivid portraits and scenes from everyday life.

She also re-imagines artworks across the centuries that have presented Roma identity in negative ways and transforms them into vibrant images imbued with strength and dignity. In this way, Mirga-Tas reinforces Roma as both a contemporary community and one that has a rich heritage on its own terms.

Mirga-Tas was the official Polish representative at the 59th Venice Biennale in 2022 – the first Roma artist to represent any country.

This will be the artist’s first major museum exhibition in the UK.

Małgorzata Mirga-Tas is organised by Tate St Ives in collaboration with the Whitworth.

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About the Artist

The work of Romani artist, educator, and activist Małgorzata Mirga-Tas (b. Zakopane) addresses anti-Roma stereotypes and engages in building an affirmative iconography of Roma communities. Her work depicts everyday life: relationships, alliances and shared activities. Mirga-Tas’s vibrant textile collages are created from materials and fabrics collected from family and friends, which imbues them with a life of their own and a corresponding immediacy. Patchworks made of curtains, jewellery, shirts, and sheets, are sewn together to form so-called ‘microcarriers’ of history, just as resulting images revise macro perspectives.

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Also Exhibiting at Tate St Ives

About the Gallery

Overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, Tate St Ives showcases work by artists including Barbara Hepworth, Marlow Moss, Naum Gabo and Patrick Heron, whose captivating works have brought international attention to St Ives and West Cornwall. Alongside displays from the Tate collection, the gallery presents modern and contemporary art from around the world through a dynamic exhibitions programme.

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Porthmeor Beach
St Ives
St Ives
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Tuesday –Sunday
10am –4:20pm
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St Ives Porthmeor Beach, St Ives
Tate St Ives
Porthmeor Beach, St Ives, St Ives, United Kingdom

Opening hours
Tuesday –Sunday
10am –4:20pm
Closed 24, 25 and 26 December
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