Transitional Objects - Photographs of Poland : Owen Hatherley

This is a book of photographs of Poland in the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s, when it became one of the success stories of European development, coming close to overtaking the UK. But you won’t find the skyscrapers, luxury flats, factories and big box warehouses that powered this ‘transition’ in here. Nor will you find a tribute to the architecture or the values of the state socialist system that preceded this shiny, conservative capitalism. Rather, this is a book of pictures of what happened in-between.

It records a seedy space of kiosks and giant adverts, of abstract mosaics and 1980s fashions, of kebab shops and protest stencils, of serious artworks and sleazy kitsch. Here, Samantha Fox meets Wojciech Fangor uptown, and the hammer and sickle lurks behind the lingerie adverts.

Owen Hatherley is a writer and editor based in south-east London. His many books include three on Eastern Europe: Across the Plaza (Strelka, 2012), Landscapes of Communism (Penguin, 2015) and The Adventures of Owen Hatherley in the Post-Soviet Space (Repeater, 2018).