Art and Art History

Mikołaj or Mik Czerwinski is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Art History Department at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His dissertation research and teaching focuses on similarities in design practice between those countries of the Eastern Bloc, especially including Poland, and those of the West during the twentieth century. By looking closely at connections between these regions, Mik challenges the notion of East as separate from the West, following the Second World War. In addition to questioning this dichotomy, he scrutinizes the perception of Easter Europe as homogenous. Rather, Mik considers the differences in design practice and its relationship to a specific place or geographic region. In reviewing design practice in Central and Eastern Europe, Mik focuses on the relationships that objects of industrial design shared with concepts of modernity. He also examines the epistemological differences between decorative or applied art and industrial design. Theoretically, his work explores the histories of globalization and commodity circulation. Scholars who Mik admires and whose work influences his scholarship: Reyner Banham, Saskia Sassen, Kobena Mercer, Byron Hamann, Joaquín Barriendo, and Maria Janion.