Since the UN in Geneva closed its doors, Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz’s Ecce Homo II will remain on site until further notice. A new meeting with the artist about the exhibition will be organized at the UN as soon as circumstances allow for it.

As visits are suspended, in order to bring the exhibition to life, the artist has decided to share with the public exclusive photos of the work in situ at the Salle des Pas Perdus of the United Nations.

Organized by the Permanent Mission of France to the United Nations in Geneva and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the exhibition was inaugurated on March 10  in the presence of Ms. Tatiana Valovaya, Director of the United Nations, Mr. Francesco Pisano, Director, United Nations Library Geneva, Mr. François Croquette, Ambassador for Human Rights in France, and Mr. Laurent Sauveur, Director of External Relations of the Human Rights Office. 

A monumental work of bronze, copper and steel, Ecce Homo II, by Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz leads us to question the very destiny of the human being, a frail floating vessel caught between two seas, between numbers and the words of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Solemn and poetic, symmetrical and chaotic, Ecce Homo II brings with it a message of both hope and severity, inviting one to reflect on the challenges faced by the migrants of today.

"Underneath the numbered immensity, letters and words emerge in their turn. Making up the text of the preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, they are a reminder that "the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy the freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people." Is this message a source of hope? Or, as it lies in deep water, does it embody the impossibility of reaching universal aspirations of equality and humanity?" Domitille D’Orgeval,

Doctor of Art History.

About Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz

Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz grew up among artists. His grandfather took part in the reconstruction of the Polish capital, and two of his uncles are renowned sculptors. In the sixties, his family immigrated to Canada. He studied at Concordia University and later at the université de Montréal, where he would also teach visual arts. Since the 1990s, Jacek Jarnuszkiewicz has developed a conceptual art that, through dreamy spaces involving both real objects and sometimes utopian, sometimes archaic forms, invites us to reflect on art and culture, science and technology, the past, present and future, and more generally on the condition of Man. Mostly known for his public art and his forays into land art, Jacek Jarnuzskiewicz has enjoyed several individuals and institutional exhibitions in Canada (Museum of Contemporary Arts, Montreal), in Poland as well as at the São Paulo Biennial.