Now Everything Will Be Different: Karolina Breguła

Films, photographs and a book that the Polish artist Karolina Breguła made in Taiwan: about residents pushed out of Daguan, a district near Taipei cleared for demolition, and about the seaside village of Xincuo, where the elements are reshaping the land. Of the Manggha Museum’s four current exhibitions, this is the only one that is not about Japan. It runs at the museum’s Europe - Far East Gallery until 25 October 2026.

The Manggha Museum on the exhibition:

Now Everything Will Be Different features works that Karolina Breguła created in Taiwan, a country to which the artist has felt a strong connection for over a decade. The exhibition opens with videos and photographs that are part of a multi-part project conducted in 2018-21 in a Daguan settlement in Banqiao near Taipei, and in Tainan, as well as its accompanying publication, Exercises in Losing Control. It then moves on to the artist’s more recent works, Pebbles (2026), The Tropic of Cancer (2025) and Low Tide (2021), created in the village of Xincuo and its surroundings.

What connects the works at the exhibition is the prospect of losing one’s home, and the anticipation of the coming change. The project in 2018-21 concerns mass demolitions and evictions in Taiwanese cities. The artist explores socio-political processes, the mechanisms of gentrification and the dominance of those in power, as well as the resistance tactics of people facing eviction.

What to expect

The show is in the Europe - Far East Gallery, the annexe added to the main Manggha building in 2015, at the same address, ul. Konopnickiej 26. The museum’s English page places it on the gallery’s ground floor. The opening took place on 17 September, together with “Tokyo Story”, and the artist gave a tour of the show the following day. Do not come expecting Japanese art here: this is a show about Taiwan, and it works more like documentary film than like a picture gallery.

The route falls into two parts. First Daguan, a neighbourhood in the Taipei suburbs whose residents were evicted to make way for demolition. Then the coast around Xincuo, with work from the last five years. The pieces to look out for:

• “Exercises in Losing Control” - the book that accompanies the Daguan project. Its last pages record two women talking to the artist more than a year after their forced move, about making their new flats feel like home.
• “The Tropic of Cancer” (2025) - a film made with two sisters who live by the sea. One of them says “Soon everything will be different”, close to the show’s own title.
• “Low Tide” (2021) - a photographic series on the changing coastal landscape.
• “Pebbles” (2026) - the newest work in the show, made this year.
• Things from abandoned homes - according to the Polish Press Agency report, the show also includes objects the artist took herself from houses due for demolition.

The museum does not publish running times for the films or a count of works. For a show built on video, allow at least 45 minutes, and closer to an hour if you want to watch the films through.

Context

Karolina Breguła was born in Katowice in 1979. She studied photography in Stockholm and Warsaw, then went to the national film school in Łódź, where she earned a doctorate in film art in 2016. She runs the Social Film Workshop at the Academy of Art in Szczecin and in recent years has also worked in Taiwan, with a solo show in Tainan in 2017.

In 2003 she made “Let Them See Us”, portraits of same-sex couples that were used in a high-profile billboard campaign against homophobia. Losing a home is not a new subject for her: her 2016 film “Office for Monument Construction” follows people from a city that has ceased to exist. It won the Golden Claw in the Another View competition at the Gdynia Film Festival.

Why a Taiwanese show in a museum of Japanese art? The Europe - Far East Gallery was set up as a place of artistic exchange between Europe and the countries of the Pacific region, not Japan alone.

Tickets and time

Regular 30 PLN, reduced 20 PLN, family 50 PLN (one adult with three children under 18, or two adults with two). There is no separate ticket for this show: the museum’s price list says a ticket covers all current exhibitions, so the same entry gets you into “Tokyo Story”, “Warrior Women” and “Akitsushima” as well. Admission is free on Tuesdays, with no exhibition excluded. Buy at the door or in advance from the museum’s online ticket shop .

Open Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00-18:00 (10 AM-6 PM), closed on Mondays. The museum recommends arriving no later than half an hour before closing. It has announced no other closures during the run. Guided group visits must be booked at least 10 days ahead. The gallery building is adapted for visitors with disabilities.

Getting there: the nearest tram and bus stops are both called Rondo Grunwaldzkie. From Wawel it is about a ten-minute walk across the Grunwaldzki bridge.

Best for anyone interested in documentary film and photography, housing and gentrification, or climate change seen up close, and for visitors curious about contemporary Taiwan. If you came to Manggha for Japanese art and samurai armour, start with “Warrior Women” and “Akitsushima” and treat this one as an extra on the same ticket.

English on site: the museum publishes the full exhibition text in English on its website, but does not say whether the labels are bilingual or the films subtitled, and no English-language tour has been announced.

Events

The museum has announced no further events for this exhibition so far. One date during the run matters for visitors:

• 14 Oct 2026, 16:00-18:00 - quiet hours at the museum: individual visits only, no groups or guided tours, the sound of films in the exhibitions clearly turned down, noise-cancelling headphones on loan at the main building’s reception - details (Polish-language page)

What the press says

Polish Press Agency (PAP) (18 Sep 2026, agency report published on dzieje.pl): an opening report on both shows in the gallery. Breguła explains that the exhibition shows what homes due for demolition look like after their residents have moved out or been evicted - link (Polish-language source). In it she says she shows “photographs of the things left behind in homes after people moved out” (our translation).

Magazyn SZUM (31 Aug 2026, editorial team): the Polish art magazine put the show on its list of the most interesting exhibitions of autumn 2026, describing it as a story about the displaced residents of Daguan and about rising sea levels - link (Polish-language source).

Two pieces so far, both informational: a season preview and an opening report. No reviews yet.

Updates

• 23 Sep 2026 - page created; dates, prices, hours and the programme checked against the Manggha Museum’s own pages.

See also

• Tokyo Story - the other show in the Europe - Far East Gallery, with the same opening and the same closing date, 25 October. Same ticket, same building, so see both in one visit.
• Warrior Women: Japanese Herstories - until 11 November. For visitors who came to Manggha for Japanese art: images of Japanese women warriors, a major theme of Edo-period culture.
• Akitsushima. The Island of Dragonflies - until 11 November, Japanese armour from the collection of Wiktoria and Adam Jurgilewicz; a very different scale and pace of visit.
• Europe - Far East Gallery - the profile of the gallery that hosts this show: what Manggha’s annexe is and how to find it.

Tickets, opening hours, and current details are on the Manggha Museum website .

Museum profile: Manggha Museum of Japanese Art and Technology .