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STUDENT STUDIO MONITOR

Student Studio Monitor was established in 2018 on the initiative of students at the University of Arts in Poznan in response to the deepening crisis in the university community, violations of labor and student rights, information chaos, and the need to strengthen the voice and influence of students in co-determining the fate of the university.

We #monitor #react #act

The pillar of the Monitor’s operation became a fanpage on Facebook, where proclamations, memes, and comments were published, mainly regarding sours at the university. We also launched an email box where student and staff members could share information and problems and events that required a response.

It started fiercely. We managed to catch Zbigniew Libera in the hallway and persuade him to appear in a spot announcing the first event.

How to install a monitor?
01.03.2018 UAP Atrium

Our first event was a picket-picnic in the Atrium, the representative part of the University located in the new building. We wanted to reclaim this space and create a platform where issues and problems related to functioning at the university could resound. During the event, one could have a cup of tea, speak at the forum, play Bingo, take advice from the rules and regulations emergency room, or write a letter to the university authorities.

Photo: Tytus Szabelski.

And here the famous artist Diana Lelonek is talkin’.

We collected more than 30 letters and voices addressed to various university managers and submitted them to the rector’s office. We also submitted other letters on a regular basis. Have we lived to see a response…?

HELL NO

We got a little pissed, because how much can you politely and culturally. Massacre. Our next event was the Great UAP Roast, where you could come and smear whoever you wanted. Such a roast for the university. There was also Protest Song Karaoke to cheer you up. If forums and official letters didn’t work then maybe blasphemy will be more effective????

But almost no one came and it was rather intimate…

Then, in June 2018, we joined the nationwide protests against the introduction of the so-called “Gowin bill” threatening the autonomy and self-governance of universities. This time we gathered again in the UAP Atrium to prepare banners and demands together.

Photo: Tytus Szabelski.

THE BANNER FROM THE NEXT PICTURE HUNG FOR 30 MINUTES.

THE RECTOR’S PEOPLE REMOVED IT RIGHT AWAY.

We also wrote a Youth Happening Manifesto on this occasion.

This was basically our last major activity. In the 2018/19 academic year, although we tried to develop the Monitor, continue to get involved and protest, we didn’t have enough power left. We were extinguished by the frustration of waiting, banging heads against the wall and constant waiting. Several of us dropped out or graduated. It was hard to resurrect the energy we had at the beginning. Along the way we got an award at the Young Wolves Festival, and we also heard back from some people, inviting us to panels, exhibitions and so on. But recognition outside the walls of UAP, was not enough motivation to keep pulling it off.

Monitor’s official funeral took place on May 18, 2019 at the Vanity Gallery in Szczecin and was combined with the launch of the zine “Nightmares of Studying” – the latest co-production of Monitor and Bomba Publishing House. At the time we wrote: “The wave of initial enthusiasm subsided and when it was necessary to get down to regular work it turned out that a dozen or so people were not enough. Other busyness, gaps in communication, slow letting go led us to one conclusion. Nothing works at this school. Not even a grassroots student collective.”

So much for the topic.

Already from beyond the grave, bidding a complete farewell to acting in this mess, we did such an action in solidarity with the fired Professor Jaroslaw Kozlowski and other unlawfully dismissed senior employees. During the inauguration of the academic year in the Atrium, several alarm clocks – similar to those used by Kozlowski in his art – suddenly started ringing.