Joanna Concejo (Poland)

Joanna Concejo was born in 1971 in Poland, in Słupsk, and studied graphics at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań. In 1998, after receiving a diploma in drawing and illustration, she settled permanently in France. Her talent as an artist was first noticed through art installations in 2002 when she was invited to participate in the Busan Biennale in Korea. Over the following years, several exhibitions of her works took place, including in Berlin and Paris. In 2004, she sent her drawings to the International Children’s Book Fair in Bologna and qualified for the illustrators’ exhibition – marking the beginning of her work in the field of illustration. Joanna Concejo’s books are published in Italy, France, Spain, Switzerland, and Poland. Under the auspices of the Format publishing house, a leporello-format book titled “The Prince in the Candy Shop,” with text by Marek Bieńczyk and Nobel laureate Olga Tokarczuk, was published in Poland and France. It has been translated into more than twenty languages and honoured with the Bologna Ragazzi Award, the White Raven from the International Youth Library in Monaco, and the Grand Prix at the Tallinn Illustration Triennial in 2023.

Joanna Concejo in Estonia:

A selection of Joanna’s illustrations and books was first seen in Estonia as part of the exhibition “Look! Polish Picture Book!” organized by the Baltic Sea Cultural Centre in Gdańsk in 2016 at the Estonian Children’s Literature Centre. Several of her works were also exhibited at the Tallinn Illustration Triennial “The Power of Picture” in 2020 at the National Library of Estonia, where she was awarded Estonian-patterned gloves, which she happily wears in winter. On August 2, 2023, Joanna Concejo’s solo exhibition opened at the Estonian Children’s Literature Centre, which the author herself presented on September 8. The same exhibition has been displayed, with the assistance of the Embassy of the Republic of Poland, at the Central Library of Saare County, the children’s department of the Lääne County Library, and the Central Library of Tapa, and it has now reached the Tartu Public Library, the University of Tartu Library, and the Tartu Toy Museum, where Concejo’s illustrations are exhibited as part of the Prima Vista art program. From May 17 to June 16, a more extensive exhibition will be on display at the Estonian National Museum in collaboration with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute. The artist herself will be in Tartu on May 16 and 17, leading tours of her exhibitions, conducting workshops, signing copies of the Estonian edition of Tokarczuk and Concejo’s book “The Lost Soul,” and participating in the opening of the exhibition on May 17 at noon at the Estonian National Museum.