Suspended Sunshine: Polish Pajaki

A Large-Scale Installation by Paula Hartmann

What happens when an ancient folk tradition meets a contemporary artistic vision? In the SHED Studio at Chetwyn Farms, the answer hangs overhead — a sweeping, luminous canopy of colour and form that stops you in your tracks.

Suspended Sunshine is a large-scale pajaki installation by Toronto-based artist Paula Hartmann, reimagining a centuries-old Polish craft through a bold, contemporary lens. Dozens of handcrafted paper chandeliers cascade from the ceiling of the studio, transforming the space into something between gallery, garden, and dream.

Tradition, Reinterpreted

Pajaki (pronounced pah-YONK-ee) are traditional Polish paper chandeliers — intricate suspended structures woven from paper, straw, and thread. Rooted in folk culture, they were historically made by hand during long winter evenings, hung from ceilings as symbols of good luck, abundance, and protection.

Paula's work honours that lineage while pushing it somewhere new. In Suspended Sunshine, the forms are larger, bolder, and more sculptural than their traditional counterparts — less domestic object, more living installation. Colour is used with intention. Scale creates drama. And yet the spirit of the original craft — joyful, communal, handmade — remains at the heart of every piece.

About the Artist

Paula Hartmann is a Toronto-based visual artist working at the intersection of folk tradition and contemporary sculpture. Originally from Germany, she has spent years exploring how traditional making practices — pajaki, Scandinavian himmeli, paper weaving — can be expanded into immersive, site-specific works.

Her installations have been featured at Nuit Blanche Toronto, the Burlington Waterfront Sculpture Trail, City of Craft, and the Gladstone House. She has collaborated with global brands including UGG, and her community-based workshops have introduced hundreds of people to the meditative joy of making by hand.

Visit the Exhibition

Suspended Sunshine is on view in the SHED Studio at Chetwyn Farms, 500 Closson Road, Prince Edward County. The studio is open during scheduled farm visits and workshop days — come for the alpacas, stay for the art.

Inspired to make your own? Join Paula for her hands-on Polish Paper Chandelier Workshop on Saturday, August 29th — all materials included, lunch on the farm.