Magdalena Abakanowicz

Magdalena Abakanowicz (20 June 1930 – 20 April 2017) was a Polish sculptor and fiber artist. She is notable for her use of textiles as a sculptural medium. She is widely regarded as one of Poland's most internationally-acclaimed artists. She was a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań, Poland from 1965 to 1990 and a visiting professor at University of California, Los Angeles in 1984. 2Early life Magdalena Abakanowicz was born to a noble landowner family in Falenty. Her mother descended from old Polish nobility. Her father came from a Polonized Tatar family, which traced its origins to Abaqa Khan (a 13th-century Mongol chieftain). Her father's family fled Russia to the newly independent Poland after the October Revolution. The Russian invasion of 1920 forced her family to flee their home, after which they moved to the city of Gdańsk. When she was nine Nazi Germany invaded and occupied Polan