The project reflects on the present condition of Lake Powidzkie – the cleanest lake in Poland – situated near a military airfield, the envisioned location of the largest US military base in the country. This proximity has transformed the area into a strategic target in the event of armed conflict.

The Sopot edition of Karol Szymkowiak’s project highlights the universal dimension of this story, presenting it as a lens through which to view challenges facing contemporary Europe. Territories once thought stable and fully formed are now rapidly reshaped under the pressure of global crises – military, political, and environmental.

The project originates in the artist’s long-term observation of changes around Lake Powidzkie – a place to which he has profound emotional and biographical ties. It was here that he spent his first holiday, and many thereafter, regarding the lake as a personal refuge.

Yet the area’s function had already shifted decades earlier. In 1953, the Soviets built Poland’s largest military airbase in Powidz, irrevocably binding the region to military operations (the facility exists to this day). From then on, the lake and its surroundings became ‘a point on the map’ – a potential nuclear target for the US air force during the Cold War, identified by the Strategic Air Command in the 1959 Nuclear Weapons Requirements Study under the code 0169-8629 5223-01750.

Today, the site houses the 33rd Air Transport Base, home to large C-130 Hercules transport aircraft, and serves as a permanent station for at least one thousand American soldiers. In 2023, a new logistics and equipment support complex (LTESM-C) was opened nearby, designed for the long-term storage and repair of US Army equipment. Its construction required clearing around 100 hectares of forest, including parts of the Natura 2000 zone and the Powidz Landscape Park.

This transformation mirrors Europe’s current tensions: nature gives way to geopolitics, the local yields to global interests, and tranquillity is displaced by military mobilisation. When the project began, the full-scale war in Ukraine had not yet erupted. Russia’s invasion in 2022 compelled the artist to reconsider the meaning of such military investments. In this new context, militarisation ceased to be merely an environmental disruption – it became emblematic of an era in which Europe once again lives under the shadow of large-scale conflict. At the same time, the unpredictable policies of the Trump administration intensified anxieties about the long-term security and sustainability of such military structures.

Meanwhile, in the shadow of this build-up, another battle unfolds: the struggle to preserve Lake Powidzkie itself. Ongoing drought, worsened by climate change, combined with nearby open-pit mining, has caused a dramatic fall in water levels. This issue appears to be of far lower priority to Polish authorities than the expansion of the military base – national defence needs become another excuse for insufficient environmental engagement.

Exhibition open:
Tuesday–Saturday: 3:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Sunday: 2:00 PM – 6:00 PM