Born in Poland
Lives and works in Warsaw, Poland.
Marta Stysiak is a Polish cinematographer, director, and visual artist. She graduated from the National Film School in Łódź (PWSFTviT), where she earned an MA degree at Cinematography department, film and television production. Her multidisciplinary practice spans video installations, film, photography, and works on paper, often engaging with themes of vulnerability, embodiment, care, and social experience.
She is a recipient of the Young Polish Contemporary Art Award Tide (European Capital of Culture Wrocław & Credit Suisse) and the Ministry of Culture and Science Film Scholarship (2020). In the same year, she was a finalist of the Mother Art Prize (Procreate Project), presenting work at Cromwell Place, London. Her video installation Badland won the Birth Rites Collection Biennale for New Works, leading to an artist residency at the Birth Rites Collection and King’s College London. The work entered the permanent collection of the BRC and later expanded into the feature-length documentary Come Home, co-produced by the Birth Rites Collection with the support of Arts Council England. Stysiak participated in the 33rd Art Colony Galichnik (North Macedonia), culminating in a group exhibition at the National Gallery Mala Stanica, Skopje (2023). The residency informed her contribution to Survival Art Review 21 and subsequent presentations at Survival Art Review 22. Stysiak is the author of photography for the Best Polish Documentary Film at Kraków Film Festival 2023, nominated for Best Polish Documentary Film Award Orły 2024. She is a member of the Female Directors of Photography Collective FDOP and Polish Filmmakers Association. In 2025/26, she is a holder of the European Union stipend under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NextGenerationEU).
Education
2002–2008
National Film School of L. Schiller, Łódź, Poland
MA, Cinematography Department, Film and Television Production
2001–2005
Teacher Training College, Radom, Poland
BA, English Language
Selected Solo & Group Shows, Screenings, and Residencies
2025
Narrations #16, site-specific Contemporary Art Review, Gdańsk, Poland
Hunger, porcelain installation, Fringe Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland
The Presence of an Artist, group exhibition, SOLO Gallery, Poland
Nouvelle Vague, Espace Sylvia Rielle, Paris, France
2024
Shadows of the Anthropocene 5, urban intervention, Warsaw, Poland
Survival Art Review 22, Wrocław, Poland
Daily News, paintings from 2020–2024, Skuza Studio, Warsaw, Poland
2023
33rd Biennale, National Gallery Skopje, North Macedonia
Survival Art Review 21 ERZAC, Wrocław, Poland
Badland, Format A4, SOLO Gallery, Radom, Poland
Artist in Residence, 33rd Art Colony Galichnik, North Macedonia
2022
Come Home, film screening, King’s College London, UK
2020–2021
Artist in Residence, Birth Rites Collection, King’s College London, UK
2020
Badland, Mother Art Prize Finalists Exhibition, Cromwell Place, London, UK
Badland, Birth Rites Collection (online / international)
Survival Art Review 18, Wrocław, Poland
2019
A4 Maximum Size, Centre of Polish Sculpture, Orońsko, Poland
2016
The Current. New Polish Art, Art Main Station by mia, Wrocław, Poland
Stysiak / Piasta: Existence, Gallery 58, Radom, Poland
2014
With, ZPAF Gallery, Warsaw, Poland
2015
WITH, group show, ESPACIO Gallery, London, UK
2014
Still Lives, group show. MOK Gallery in Olsztyn
With, Solo show, ZPAF Gallery, Warsaw, Poland
2011
Holocaust Memorial Day Festival, film screening, Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK
2010
The Drop, The FleaPit, London, UK
The Drop, Candid Room Gallery, London, UK
2009
Optimistic Immigrants, Kinescope New European Art Collective, Brighton, UK (Launch Screening)
Underground City, Divus, group show, London, UK
RePlace, group exhibition, Ada Gallery, London, UK
City and…, group exhibition, Radom, Poland
2008
Third International Festival of Experimental Film and Video Art in Rybnik, II award for the experimental film Synergy, Poland
Film and Video Works (Selected)
2026
The Perfect Woman, feature documentary film (director, writer, cinematographer)
2024
Fragments of Vulnerability, five-channel video installation
2023
Anamorphic Walk to the Stars, video installation (with Igor Sekovski), National Gallery Skopje
Etherium, video installation, National Gallery Skopje
2023–2024
Faces of Agata, feature documentary film (director of photography)
Best Polish Documentary Film, Kraków Film Festival 2023
2022
Come Home, feature documentary film (writer, director, director of photography), Birth Rites Collection / Arts Council England
2020
Badland, video installation (Mother Art Prize finalist; winner, Birth Rites Collection Biennale)
2019
A Picture of a Beast Precedes the Beast, short feature film
2016
Sing, feature documentary film (director of photography)
2012
The Princess and the Wall, documentary film, Studio Munka / Polish Film Institute (director of photography)
2010
Happened Here, feature documentary film (co-director, cinematographer)
The Drop, short feature film
2004–2009
Short documentary, experimental, and fiction films produced at the National Film School in Łódź
Awards and Grants (Selected)
2025/26
European Union Stipend – National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NextGenerationEU)
2023
Best Polish Documentary Film, Kraków Film Festival (Faces of Agata)
Best Polish Documentary Film Polish Film Awards 2024 Orły Nomination
2020
Ministry of Culture and Science Film Scholarship, Poland
Birth Rites Collection Biennale for New Works Winner
Mother Art Prize Finalist
2016
Young Polish Contemporary Art Award Tide, European Capital of Culture Wrocław & Credit Suisse