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802% ABOVE THE NORM
In July 2007 portraits of socialist "model workers" hung in the streets of Polish towns. It was then that the Imago Mundi Foundation and the Visavis.pl Photographers’ Collective collaborated in the outdoor exhibition event entitled "802% Above the Norm".


The exhibition was displayed in the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, and comprised two hundred photographs of Henryk Makarewicz and Wiktor Pental, as well as a multimedia installation by Anna Gawlikowska. A documentary film, "Real Utopia" (dir. Andrzej Kramarz, Renata Plaga) was also screened, as well as photocasts, which are photographic presentations (produced by The Visavis Photographers’ Collective) with first-hand commentary from witnesses of the past era. Thanks to citylights and billboards the workers’ portraits became a part of the capital’s cityscape. Huge portraits of the "front rank workers" hung off The Palace of Culture and Science, a symbol of Soviet Russia’s "friendship" with Poland.


In December 2007 the photographs were presented in the place, where most of them were taken – in Cracow’s district of Nowa Huta. The old "Światowid" cinema (1958-1992) became an exhibition hall, and an outdoor exhibition of some of the photographs in the Small Market Square in the heart of Cracow’s Old Town managed to create a hotchpotch of photography with the urban surroundings.


The next stage of the project is the publishing of an album containing the works of Makarewicz and Pental "802% above the norm. Early years of Nowa Huta".