Aniela Piasecka’s practice spans performance for galleries, film, digital technologies, unconventional spaces and theatres; it also includes community practice, facilitation, and teaching. Underpinning all Aniela’s work is a desire for collaboration as a methodology to resist atomisation and forge artistic companionship, beyond the model of the solo artist. They view their practice as inherently relational and engaged with queer feminist phenomenology – to excavate sites of sensitivity in the bodies of performers and audiences alike. 

Her performance works are invested in the act of reconsidering both making and presenting norms. Whether by questioning the singular notion of the artist/choreographer, by working in the space ‘between’ genres and practices, or with bodies that exhibit a flagrant tendency towards what might be perceived as ‘deviance’ or ‘dysfunction’.

Over the last five years research has been developing around: the choreography of pain, the interplay of risk and erotics in somatic experiences, and biopsychosocial research into the ‘functions’ of the body.

They are the lead artist of collaborative project STASIS, founded in 2014 with Isabel Palmstierna, Paloma Proudfoot and Wet Mess. The group’s most recent performance was presented at Glasgow International 2023 at SWG3 and the same year they were nominated for the Paul Hamlyn Award.

They also frequently work in other collaborative constellations, notably with sculptor Paloma Proudfoot (as Proudfoot & Piasecka) and dance artist Kirstin Halliday with whom they are co-choreographing ‘Desert Grassland Whiptail Lizards’ about the “lesbian lizard” species of the same name.

They have been a contributing performer to Myriam Lefkowitz’s ‘Walk, Hands, Eyes’, jointly acquired by the National Galleries of Scotland and the collections of Edinburgh University. From 2024 she will support this performance further in the capacity of ‘Practice Holder’.  

Past works have been presented with Bergen Kunsthall, Norway; CAPC Museum of Modern Art, Bordeaux, France; The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland; CCA, Glasgow, UK; Den Frie Centre of Contemporary Art and Dansehallerne, Copenhagen, Denmark; Cubitt Gallery, London, UK; Soy Capitan Gallery, Berlin, Germany.

Recent residencies and exchanges include Villa Arson, France; Centre de Création CCOV Tiohtià:ke/ Montreal x Take Me Somewhere Festival; Beweggrund in Bern, Switzerland; Dance Ireland; Tramway, and Hospitalfield, Scotland. They have received research support from British Council, LoveDanceScotland, UNLIMITED, Scottish Contemporary Arts Network, Lisa Ullman Travelling Scholarship Fund as well as funding from Creative Scotland.