True art is not a distraction. It makes you focus
and makes your life better.
My name is Paulina Polkowska and I am Polish photographer based in Barcelona. I now specialise in documentary photography around personal growth and all the word of Awareness and Consciousness encompasses.
After a degree in Spanish and Translation studies, I spent over ten years building bridges between people by using words. Towards the end of 2014, I wanted to do something more creative. I trained in professional photography first and then centred on documentary photography (IEFC, DateCuenta School of Communications, Documentary Photography with photo-journalist Jordi Oliver and others). Out of a deep-rooted interest, I have also studied vibrational and energetic therapies (Reiki, Radiesthesia, Akashic Registers) and I have some basic understanding of some self-knowledge tools (Psychological and Karmic Astrology, Numerology, the Enneagram).
I greatly respect and look up to work which related to any aspect of consciousness. Even simple interest in these topics and a desire to be more awake and want to leave this crazy system and live your life more in line with yourself and your values is worthy of admiration. At the start of 2019 I decided to gamble everything in order to live my dream: this project. I gave up my old job, quit the business and went through a tough transition period. The change from my previous life to what it is now coincided with health problems, but yet again I decided to set up my own business. This time, however, I felt it was my true calling. It was leap in the dark, ignoring established wisdom such as: art won’t earn you a living.
I suffered eating disorders (amongst them bulimia) for over a decade.
Illness and circumstances led me to search for solutions ever since my teenage years, going through several transformations. This experience resulted in a spiritual quest as well as an enquiry into the inner psychology of the human being from a young age, while I also dealt with periods of depression, anxiety and confusion. With time, I have come to appreciate what happened to me, since it has helped me know better who I am today. The driving forces of my healing were creativity, movement and self-knowledge.
An inflexion point in my life was taking part in Borja Vilaseca's Master's in Personal Development and Leadership...
… from November 2017 to June 2018. That is when an old way of seeing things slowly died away. It was also then that the idea of this project was first conceived. During a creative brainstorming session at Mónica Fusté’s retreat in May 2018, my classmate Bianca asked me: Why don’t you photograph these experiences for a living? Some months later, collaborating with Iurancha Foguet in her retreats and workshops, built around an extraordinary work with the body and its memories, I kept being asked by personal development professionals to take their photos. And then I noticed:
This is what I want now. I have found it.
So, through photography, I take on the visual aspect of the world of personal development, both as an individual and socially. This was a world I already knew, and, through my pictures, I wanted to bear witness of the people who, wholeheartedly, work to help the expansion of Consciousness.
My photos, articles and videos are there to provide a service. But I also want to talk about the topics I consider most important and can also help you see a different perspective: self-knowledge, the body and creativity all in the service of healing.
Apart from my pictures, I would also like to divulge your work through my specialised Facebook and Instagram profiles (Fotografía y Conciencia).
This might be crazy, because neither at school nor on the courses or the photography workshops I have taken nor at University was I taught how to deal with “this”. This is what I want to do and transmit. There is no user manual, no script. What I can guarantee is that I will give it my all. It is not only making my dream come true; it is also helping you show the world yours.
In my daily work, I try to bring together photography with writing, nature and my enquiries into the human psyche. But these are not my only passions: I can’t imagine my life without literature or cinema. These two languages may seem different at first, but they both take us on inner journeys and stoke the imagination; both allow us to live many lives in one. I also love travelling, sport and music – though I wish I had been more constant when learning an instrument! And of course – as all those who have met me in the past few years will know – Astrology, the Kabbalah, Numerology and all those symbolic languages that help us know ourselves better and explain the laws that govern the universe metaphysically. In short, the occult and what has been hidden for many centuries and which now, fortunately, is within reach of many more people.
Who is it for?
- It’s for therapists, coaches and everyone who works ethically in the field of personal growth and holistic health, helping other people to improve their quality of life and, thus, contributing to a better society.
- It’s for entrepreneurs who are committed to getting out of the imposed system and who need more visibility and presence for their website, social media, etc.
- It’s for companies with awareness: sustainable and socially responsible.
- It’s for NGOs with transparency and best practices.
- It’s for artists and creative people who wish to have a deeper image of what they represent and what they do.
And...
it’s for everyone who likes traveling, nature and self-knowledge, and who would like to have photos related to these topics. I am open to working in any project that follows values of ethics, commitment and responsibility and that, besides that, wants to express itself in a beautiful way in order to reach more people. At the end of the day, what we all want is for people to not just know about our work, but to SEE IT.
To sum up, my project is dedicated to individuals, societies and companies that want to make this world a little better and would like to do their part to enrich individual and collective awareness. My own personal contribution is to use my creativity and sensitivity to make the intangible tangible.
About me and the project
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