Kama Zboralska - "Chciałbym rozumieć świat, jako pieśń o miłości". Niezwykle to romantyczne, szczególnie w dzisiejszych czasach…
Łukasz Krupski - To, że bym chciał tak go rozumieć nie oznacza, że on taki jest. Nie mam złudzeń co do tego, że jest pełen bezsensownego cierpienia, brutalnej przemocy. Nie mam też złudzeń co do natury człowieka. Ale nasze myśli, nasza wola mają znaczenie, a miłość, to znaczy dobro, które powstaje w relacji, jest światłem w tym świecie. Maksymalizacja tego dobra, które nigdy nie jest wbrew, przeciwko komukolwiek, jest sensem życia. Rozmawiamy o rzeźbie, ale to życie, właśnie wola, interpretacja rzeczywistości, myśl człowieka są fundamentem sztuki i jej pierwowzorem wtedy, kiedy powstaje dzieło sztuki. "Pieśń o miłości" jest komentarzem do rzeźby "Pieśń nad Pieśniami" i nawiązuje do dwóch wzorców kulturowych. Do najpiękniejszego erotyka w literaturze, jakim jest dla mnie "Pieśń nad pieśniami", czyli jedno z podstawowych źródeł w naszej kulturze judeochrześcijańskiej. Istnieje też piękny opis stworzenia w hinduskiej tradycji wed, który mówi o tym, że świat jest śpiewany, jest tworzony za pomocą śpiewu. Ciekawe, że w muzyce rockowej czy muzyce pop większość piosenek np. Beatlesów, Presleya, czy Queen jest o miłości, o zakochaniu, a rzeźba częściej wykorzystywana jest jako nośnik dla innych tematów. Jest tak prawdopodobnie dlatego, że przez tysiąclecia, rzeźba miała swoje funkcje wyznaczane przez mecenasów, instytucje religijne czy państwowe, które miały swoje opowieści do przekazania społeczeństwu i nie miały wiele wspólnego z zakochaniem. Myślę, że czeka mnie jeszcze wiele rzeźb o tematyce miłości, wiele rzeźb czeka na wyrzeźbienie, powstanie z nicości...
- Mówisz, że Twoje decyzje są ostateczne, są nie do cofnięcia. Dotyczy to spraw życiowych czy przede wszystkim samego procesu twórczego?
Rzeźba w kamieniu uczy tej trudnej prawdy o nieodwracalności czasu. Wiemy, że można naprawiać błędy z przeszłości, ale przeszłość jest brutalnie ostateczna i nigdy się jej nie cofnie. Mam czasem pokusę poprawiania starych rzeźb, ale staram się tego nie robić, są to w końcu ślady utrwalone w materii, ślady myśli, uczuć, których często już nie ma poza rzeźbą, w której zostały zaklęte. To jest wielka potęga rzeźby - patrzymy na posąg greckiej bogini sprzed kilku tysiącleci i możemy obejrzeć kawałek duszy autora z czasów, których już nie ma.
- Do pewnego momentu skupiłeś się na rzeźbie sakralnej. Na ile ważna jest dla Ciebie religia?
Rzeźba sakralna ma oczywiście swoje miejsce w kulturze, która nomen omen wywodzi się z kultu i właśnie tu sztuka sakralna ma swoje miejsce. Ja przy tym bardzo żałuję, że nie udaje się we współczesnym dyskursie o sztuce łączyć sztuki sakralnej ze sztuką współczesną. Jest ona często separowana w miejscach kultu. Tymczasem, mimo laicyzacji, kryzysu instytucji religijnych w Polsce i na świecie, sakrum jest dla mnie podstawowym punktem odniesienia. I to sakrum wykraczające poza ramy jedynej słusznej religii. Nie potrafię znaleźć sensu świata zamykając się na wymiar wyłącznie materialny i szukam tego sensu w obszarze duchowym, który jest także domeną sztuki. Akurat cykl "Pustych piet", które odnoszą się do tematu religijnego powstał, kiedy byłem w największej religijnej i duchowej pustce. Dzieło sztuki, zarówno, kiedy oglądam je jako odbiorca, jak i wtedy, kiedy je tworzę, ma jeszcze to potężne zastosowanie, że wytwarza rzeczywistość, której duchowo potrzebuję. Ta rzeczywistość wytworzona w obszarze sztuki ma moc ratować życie, sens życia i tak chyba było w moim przypadku. Starożytni Grecy nazywali tę funkcję "Katharsis" to znaczy oczyszczenie. Sacrum znaczy dosłownie tajemnica. Ma ona w sobie to podstawowe znaczenie, że jest nieznana. Wspomniałem o miłości jako ważnym elemencie twórczości, a to jest drugi najważniejszy. Odkrywanie, zmaganie się o kształt tajemnicy to dla mnie najważniejszy cel życia i twórczości. Niestety najczęściej jest to zmaganie pełne bólu, pustki, samotności, podobne do zmagania Syzyfa wciąż na nowo wtaczającego swój kamień po to, by za chwilę ponownie podejmować ten sam wysiłek.
- Czy suknia kupiona w Jerozolimie, którą zakładasz do pracy ma wymiar symboliczny? Czy wierzysz w jej moc?
Nie wierzę w jej moc, ale wierzę w moc opowieści. To moja osobista opowieść, moje nadawanie znaczeń przedmiotom. Można powiedzieć, że to zboczenie zawodowe, bo w końcu rzeźbienie to wytwarzanie przedmiotów i nadawanie im znaczeń. Lubię tworzyć własne, prywatne mity. Będąc w Ziemi Świętej, o ile pamiętam, na Górze Ośmiu Błogosławieństw znalazłem na ziemi prosty drewniany pierścień. Jest wielce prawdopodobne, że przyniósł go tam anioł i że była to obrączka łącząca mnie z rzeźbą, ze światem sztuki. Po którymś przegranym konkursie na pomnik wściekły rzuciłem nią o ścianę i obrączka pękła na dwoje. Ciągle czekam na dobry moment aby ją skleić. Nadawanie znaczeń ma znaczenie...
W Katedrze Warszawskiej, przy pracy nad drogą krzyżową, nie chciałem bezpośrednio, w sposób widoczny pokazywać mojego cierpienia związanego z katastrofą smoleńską, w której zginął mój Ojciec. Ale w jednej z tablic od strony wewnętrznej zamieściłem gałązkę, którą urwałem ze złamanej brzozy w miejscu katastrofy.
- Inną odsłoną były „Narodziny Wenus”, rzeźba dość erotyczna… Ziemskie życie może dawać rozkosz, radość, a czyż nie powinniśmy myśleć przede wszystkim o sprawach ostatecznych?
To jest jedno z największych nieporozumień kultury zachodniej. Oddzielenie ducha i ciała. Ta separacja jest bardzo widoczna w kulturze chrześcijańskiej, ale ma starsze źródła. Św. Paweł Apostoł – jeden z najważniejszych interpretatorów nauczania Jezusa oraz św. Jan Ewangelista byli pod istotnym wpływem myśli greckiej. To u Platona pierwszy raz tak mocno zostaje oddzielone ciało od ducha. To już wtedy zaczyna się tragedia Erosa wypędzonego za próg sakrum. To oczywiście uproszczenie, ale nie mamy tutaj czasu na pogłębioną dyskusję. Ja się z tym wystawieniem Erosa za próg duchowości nie zgadzam i wyrażam to w swojej rzeźbie. Jeszcze mocniejszym przedstawieniem niż "Narodziny Wenus" jest "Święte ciało". To jest mój swoisty manifest w rzeźbie, próba połączenia ciała i ducha. To konkretna rzeźba, ale myślę, że taka w ogóle jest natura rzeźby, jest jedną wielką próbą połączenia tych dwóch zdających się być w sprzeczności ze sobą rzeczywistości.
- Każdą Twoją pracę otacza, metafizyczna aura duchowości. „Oświecenie” ma w sobie pękniecie wzdłuż całej postaci, nie jest ono „zwykłą” pustką. Jest tajemnicą, jest zaproszeniem do refleksji nad tym co istotne?
To jest jedna z prób ukazania tej duchowości w materii. W rzeźbie jest to największa sztuka, ponieważ rzeźba jest najbardziej materialną ze wszystkich dziedzin sztuki. Jest to bardzo trudne, bo zawiera w sobie sprzeczność - jak grudy gliny mają opowiadać, "śpiewać", jak mają wyrażać tę metafizyczną przestrzeń. Dla mnie odpowiedzią jest człowiek, którego natura wyraża właśnie tę podwójną dualistyczną rzeczywistość. I dlatego rzeźba jest trudnym, ale według mnie najbliższym człowiekowi medium mogącym służyć tej refleksji, zadawaniu pytań o swoją naturę.
- Według buddyzmu wszystko zaczyna się od pustki, jest początkiem wszystkiego…„Katedra” też wciąga w swoje intrygujące wnętrze - dusza istnieje przed naszymi narodzinami i po naszej ziemskiej śmierci…
Tak jest w buddyzmie, hinduizmie i wielu innych tradycjach duchowości, które na przestrzeni tysiącleci wyrażały ludzką potrzebę, nasze dążenie do nadania sensu rzeczywistości, w której przyszło nam zaistnieć. Dobrą ilustracją jest tu figura Edypa, którą rzeźbiłem w Belgii. Edyp jest bohaterem greckim, symbolem najmądrzejszego z ludzi, który dowiedziawszy się o swojej prawdzie, o fatum, które dosięgnęło go, mimo że całe życie przed nim uciekał, na końcu swojej drogi sam się oślepił. Tak jak postać Fausta z dramatu Goethego, który "stanąwszy na życia szczycie" stanął tam ślepy. Podobnie Ozyrys i Thoth bogowie mitologii egipskiej, Odyn i Hodur z mitologii nordyckiej, Szaweł, znany nam bardziej jako św. Paweł Apostoł jeden z największych świętych chrześcijańskich, hinduski Dhrishtadyumna, bohater buddyjski, mistrz zen Huangbo i wiele innych. A jednak wszystkie mówią tę samą prawdę, o konieczności wglądu w siebie samego "oczami wewnętrznymi", "oczami duszy". Wiele z tych tradycji nie mogło mieć ze sobą styczności, powstały często niezależnie od siebie. Istnieje taki wymiar prawdy, która przykryta płaszczem różnych opowieści, mitów jest powszechna. Dziś, kiedy niemal wszystko można wytłumaczyć językiem nauki, miłość wzorami chemicznymi, przywiązanie człowieka do sakrum psychospołecznymi uwarunkowaniami, uważam, że potrzeba nam takiej kultury i sztuki, która przypomina poprzez nieśmiertelne kody kulturowe, o których wspomniałem przed chwilą, o tym, że człowiek i sam świat jest "głębszy" niż one same. Że "najważniejsze jest niewidoczne dla oczu" i że "są na tym świecie rzeczy, które nie śniły się naszym filozofom"...
- Według buddyzmu wabi-sabi to uczucie smutnego piękna, które może wywołać widok zmurszałej, zniszczonej ławki, rozpadającej się kolumny. Takie piękno na Ciebie działa?
A czy Wenus z Milo z utrąconymi kończynami, nie jest piękniejsza, niż kiedy stała jeszcze nowa, taka śliczna, wypolerowana w jednej z greckich świątyń? Architektura jako symbol zniszczenia i zmartwychwstania była motywem przewodnim w drodze krzyżowej, którą wyrzeźbiłem w Archikatedrze Warszawskiej. Piękno zawarte w zniszczeniu jest też genialnie wyrażone w buddyzmie w filozofii zen, którą znamy w znaku Tao. Życie i śmierć, światło i ciemność, dusza i ciało współistnieją ze sobą, wynikają z siebie, są sobie niezbędne.
- Jak poznać że czyjaś dusza jest piękna ?
To bardzo trudne pytanie i najprościej odpowiedzieć, że nie wiem. Mimo, że nad naturą duszy pochylali się najwięksi filozofowie, pisał o niej Platon, Arystoteles, św. Tomasz z Akwinu myślę, że ostatecznej odpowiedzi nie mamy możliwości uzyskać. Możemy się do niej zbliżać, ale znów mamy do czynienia z wielką tajemnicą człowieka. Wierzę, że pierwiastek duchowy jest niepodzielny i nieśmiertelny i że jest rzeczywistością pierwotniejszą niż nasze życie biologiczne. Każda dusza pierwotnie jest piękna, bo jest bytem, jest istnieniem, ale życie niszczy tę naturę. Nie chcę usprawiedliwiać zła, ale każde zło z czegoś pochodzi, wynika z doznanego zła i bywa, że w pewnym momencie dusza przestaje być piękna. Choć chcę wierzyć, że nigdy do końca...
- Zmieniają się kanony piękna, ale czy można powiedzieć, że coś jest obiektywnie piękne?
Pamiętajmy, że piękno to idea. Żyjemy w czasie, kiedy nie tylko nie ma już konsensu dotyczącego kanonów piękna w życiu oraz w sztuce. Nie tylko nie ma już zgody, co do tego, że w ogóle mogą takie obiektywne zasady dotyczące piękna zaistnieć, ale piękno w ogóle jest zakwestionowane jako wartość, którą w sztuce powinno się osiągać. Pamiętajmy też, że piękno estetyczne, ładność, przyjemność wynikająca z obcowania z podobającej się odbiorcy estetyki to jedno, ale piękno jako idea opisana jeszcze przez Platona jako wyraz, obraz, ucieleśnienie dobra to inne pojęcie. Filozofia idei Platona opowiada nam o naszej rzeczywistości jako niedoskonałym odbiciu doskonałych ideii. A więc piękno jest nieosiągalne i nie możliwe do pełnego obiektywnego wyrażenia przez człowieka, chyba, że byłby Bogiem. Ja nim nie jestem, więc obiektywnie nie potrafię go przedstawić w rzeźbie. Ale wspomnę też o filozofii Norwida, który w genialnym poemacie "Promethidion" rozważa możliwość docierania do piękna i ostatecznie wyraża je w słynnym "piękno kształtem jest miłości". Tłumacząc na Platona powiedziałbym, że piękno kształtem jest dobra i prawdy. Nawet jeśli jest to szczyt syzyfowej góry warto poświęcić swoją twórczość rzeźbiarską zmaganiu się o nią, docieraniu do niej. Być może jest to wiara głupca, ale wierzę, że warto poświęcić życie dla tej być może bezsensownej wędrówki Syzyfa.
- Podobno "piękne nie jest to, co się podoba, ale co powinno się podobać". Tylko kto o tym ma decydować?
Wskazałaś według mnie najsłabszy punkt myśli Norwida, bo to jego słowa. Współcześnie bardzo często rozwiązuje się kwestie oceny sztuki, czy innych wartości kulturowych za pomocą mechanizmów demokracji - większość decyduje o tym co piękne. I nie wiem, czy gorzej, kiedy spotyka się stu laików, czy stu ekspertów, by o tym decydować. Mam ten komfort, póki tworzę, że w moim świecie rzeźby mam absolutną "władzę sądu" estetycznego. Oczywiście jest ona ograniczana w kontakcie z zamawiającym. Ale kiedy jest mi brutalnie odbierana, jak pisze Herbert w "Potędze smaku", obracam się na pięcie i wychodzę.
- Tworzysz bardzo osobiste portrety najważniejszych dla Ciebie artystów i poetów. Rzeźbisz twarz Rodina, Michała Anioła, Miłosza, Herberta, Norwida… Inspirują swoją twórczością, ale także osobowością?
Nie tylko artystów, ale też filozofów, czy osób, które znam. Wszystkie te osoby inspirują, mają na mnie wpływ w różnych elementach twórczości. Portret jest formą spotkania. Artystów, o których wspomniałaś, mam okazję spotykać w ich twórczości, mam okazję spotykać inspirując się formalnie, czy zapożyczając wątki z ich twórczości w mojej rzeźbie. Rzeźbiąc ich przypominam sobie o tym, że jestem ogniwem większej całości, która ma ciągłość. Wyjątkową drogą spotkania jest portret. W filozofii nurtu fenomenologicznego istnieje bardzo ciekawy obszar zwany filozofią spotkania, której autorem jest Emmanuel Levinas. Jego myśl w Polsce jest lepiej znana poprzez filozofię dramatu ks. Józefa Tischnera. Levinas mówi o spotkaniu "innego" i o tym, że do spotkania dochodzi poprzez twarz "innego". To twarz (oblicze) jest, będącym na pograniczu fizyki i metafizyki, obszarem spotkania. Jest w jakimś sensie transcendentna. Znów jak mantra powtarzam, że rzeźba może mieć w sobie ogromną siłę oddziaływania. W rzeźbie portret pozwala na kilka różnych form spotkania. Mogę spotykać osoby nieżyjące, przywracać ich obecność. Rzeźba jest znakiem obecności i spotkania.
- Najbardziej poruszający jest Twój autoportret…
To bardzo trudne spotkanie i chyba całego życia nie starcza, aby w końcu do siebie dotrzeć, móc spotkać siebie. Każda rzeźba powinna być w jakimś stopniu autoportretem, spotkaniem ze sobą. Ten autoportret powstawał, kiedy byłem w bardzo trudnej sytuacji życiowej i jest śladem tamtego mnie, tamtych uczuć.
- Nie tylko poezja jest dla Ciebie źródłem uczty duchowej ale fascynuje też Ciebie filozofia. Immanuel Kant wypowiedział słynne zdanie, które wplotłeś w jedną ze swoich rzeźb: “Dwie rzeczy zadziwiają mnie najbardziej, niebo gwiaździste nade mną i prawo moralne we mnie”. Jak to interpretować?
Kant wyprowadza z tego "prawa moralnego" istniejącego w człowieku dowód na istnienie absolutu. Ale tutaj akurat się z nim nie zgadzam, można kształtowanie naszego sumienia wytłumaczyć społecznymi uwarunkowaniami. W tym zdaniu, chyba najsłynniejszym z jego filozofii, można jednak wyczytać kilka prawd, z którymi się utożsamiam. Po pierwsze zdziwienie to początek nie tylko dochodzenia do prawdy w filozofii, ale dla mnie jest ono pierwszym krokiem procesu twórczego. To bardzo przybliża mnie do świata filozofii. "Niebo gwiaździste nade mną i prawo moralne (rzeczywistość metafizyczna) we mnie" to rzeczywistości, o których rozmawiamy, rzeczywistości, które próbuję ze sobą spotkać w rzeźbie.
Filozofia ma dla mnie znaczenie fundamentalne w perspektywie rzeźby. Rzeźba jest rodzajem zwierciadła rzeczywistości, a zatem poznawanie rzeczywistości taką jaka ona jest, taką jaka wydaje się być, taka jaką chciałbym, aby była, jest dla mnie źródłem rzeźby. Nawiązując znów do Platona uważam, że piękno jest co prawda niezbędne prawdzie i dobru by te zaistniały, ale jest też od nich pochodne i zależne.
- Dla Ciebie sam kontakt z materią, kamieniem jest już mistycznym przeżyciem. Pewną magią, tworzysz w kawałku skały wyrwanej naturze, kilkaset milionów lat temu była ona świadkiem "rodzenia się ziemi"…Mówisz: "kamień uczy pokory". Obraz zawsze można przemalować. Proces powstawania rzeźby jest niezwykle pracochłonny, emocjonujący, wymagający wielu wyrzeczeń. Sam talent nie wystarczy, potrzebne doświadczenie, intuicja, wrażliwość i niezliczone godziny spędzone w samotni…
Jest w procesie twórczym zapisany dramat, który trudno zrozumieć z zewnątrz, ponieważ jest bardzo osobistym dramatem, a przy tym bardzo złożonym. Proces twórczy przypomina sam proces życia widziany trochę w soczewce, bardziej intensywnie. A życie to też i umieranie, jak w filozofii zen. A w chrześcijaństwie, umieranie to zmartwychwstawanie. Mam takie poczucie, nie tylko w pracy w kamieniu, że tworzenie jest "ścieraniem, spalaniem się". Że oddaję rzeźbie swoje zdrowie, swoje nerwy, najgłębsze uczucia. I rzeczywiście po takim intensywnym kilkumiesięcznym procesie jestem jak wyciśnięta pomarańcza. Jakbym coś bezpowrotnie oddał temu kawałkowi materii. Bardzo szanuję ten kawałek materii, który jest w jakimś sensie moją "siostrą". Moja biologiczna materia powstała razem z nią, razem jesteśmy dziećmi gwiazdy, nasze pierwiastki powstały w wyniku "wielkiego wybuchu". I kiedyś tę moją materię zwrócę ziemi. Najtrudniejsze jest jednak nie fizyczne, ale duchowe, psychiczne i społeczne zmaganie. Jest to zmaganie na "śmierć i życie". Pewnie znów posądzisz mnie o romantyzm, ale uwierz mi, kiedy się dotyka swoich granic, nie ma w tym nic romantycznego.
- Rzeźba jako jedyne medium sztuki pozwala na włączenie zmysłu dotyku. Dotykając myślimy o artyście, który zmagał się z materią, samym sobą. O jej niezwykłości świadczy fakt, że ten ślad ludzkiej myśli zaklętej w kamieniu być może odczyta inny człowiek. A może przeniesie w przyszłość wartości trwalsze niż ona sama? To jest Twoje marzenie?
Utrwalanie leży w naturze rzeźby rozumianej tradycyjnie. Ale dziś, w epoce "płynnej nowoczesności", jak określał ją Zygmunt Bauman, sztuka powinna wyrażać moment, nietrwałość, również ulotność wartości. Mam świadomość, że moja rzeźba związana jest z poszukiwaniem tego, co trwałe. Mam świadomość, że czasem jest to walka Don Kichota z wiatrakami. Jeśli więc pytasz, czy jest to moje marzenie, aby odkrywać w rzeźbie znaki trwalsze niż ona sama, to tak i nie. Jest moją głęboką potrzebą dzielenie się tymi odkryciami w rzeźbie z innymi, ale z tym zastrzeżeniem, że nie uważam mojej filozofii za jedyną słuszną i bardziej traktuję te rzeźby jak pytania, niż odpowiedzi. Poza tym jeśli rzeźba może nieść ze sobą jakieś dobro, utrwalać je i to utrwalać poza ramy mojego życia biologicznego, to tak to marzy mi się taka sztuka. I jest to kolejna niemal magiczna właściwość nie tylko rzeźby, ale sztuki w ogóle. Rzeźbiąc dziś samotnie rzeźbę, mogę toczyć dialog i proponować spotkanie nie tylko z tymi, których już nie ma, ale z człowiekiem przyszłości, który jeszcze nie zaistniał. Czy to nie genialne?
- Niektóre Twoje rzeźby są błękitne, według poety Johanna Goethego autora słynnej „Teorii kolorów” ta barwa daje wrażenie chłodu… przypomina nieco cień.
Jestem bardzo związany z tradycją malarstwa europejskiego. Ostatnio bardzo mocno przemawia do mnie twórczość Jerzego Nowosielskiego. Kolor jest bardzo ważnym nośnikiem przekazu artystycznego w rzeźbie, ale najczęściej jest naturalnym kolorem materii uzależnionym od bryły i naturalnego światła. Kolor dodany przeze mnie, zwłaszcza imitacja światła na powierzchni rzeźby uniezależniająca bryłę rzeźby od światła naturalnego to sztuka w sztuce, którą ciągle odkrywam. Widzę, że ten kolor wpływa na moje emocje i ma istotną rolę w "reżyserowaniu" emocjami, które chcę, aby rzeźba wywoływała, dlatego coraz bardziej ten obszar eksploruję. Błękit, jak mówisz, jest rzeczywiście trochę jak cień neutralny, ale to zależy od odcienia. Przede wszystkim jest dla mnie nośnikiem aury metafizycznej. A zatem jest to znów obszar poszukiwania niematerialnego w materialnym.
- A siebie jakim kolorem byś opisał ?
Pewnie granatem, szafirem, kolorem rozgwieżdżonego nieba. Bardziej lubię lazur, jest przyjemniejszy, ale niestety mój jest bardziej ciemny.
- Rzeźba kiedyś była o wiele bardziej doceniana i na pewno zdecydowanie bardziej popularna. Teraz przeżywa kryzys szczególnie ta przedstawiająca figurę ludzką. W przestrzeni miejskiej pojawiają się teraz obiekty, konstrukcje architektoniczne. Czyżby nie było chętnych podjąć się takim wyzwaniom?
Istnieją dziś obok siebie tradycyjni rzeźbiarze oraz ci wyrażający się za pomocą nowoczesnych środków wyrazu, obiektów ready-mades, minimalistycznych instalacji, czy nawet wpisanych dziś w obszar rzeźby performensów. Nie mam problemu z tym, że wykorzystywane są nowe środki wyrazu, że współczesny artysta poszukuje takiego języka sztuki, aby tę bardzo dziś skomplikowaną rzeczywistość, kondycję człowieka współczesnego, wyrazić. Jeśli popatrzymy z metapoziomu na rozwój stylów artystycznych na przestrzeni historii to zobaczymy, że sztuka to zwierciadło człowieka, że możemy zobaczyć, co było dla człowieka danej epoki ważne, piękne na danym etapie dziejów. I wydaje mi się, choć to właściwie ocenią dopiero z dystansu nasi "późni wnukowie", że ta sztuka współczesna, tak zróżnicowana, zdająca się bałaganem, czasem bełkotem, wrzaskiem, skandalem jest głębokim i prawdziwym odbiciem współczesności. Inną rzeczą jest to, że bardzo często, choć nie zawsze, sztuka, którą oglądam w galeriach współczesności jest po prostu słaba, łatwa i jest odgrzewaniem starych już kotletów. Rzadko spotykam, minimalistyczną rzeźbę, która dorównywałaby swoim pierwowzorom w postaci twórczości Brancusiego, rzadko robią na mnie wrażenie obiekty, które same w sobie nie mają żadnej wartości estetycznej, które 50 czy 100 lat temu podobnie przemawiały w twórczości Duchampa, czy Beuysa. I na pewno uważam za zubożenie to, że obok tych nowoczesnych środków w tych galeriach nie pokazuje się twórczości silniej nawiązującej do tradycji, również będącej wyrazem poszukiwań człowieka
w s p ó ł c z e s n e g o.
- Coraz trudniej jednoznacznie stwierdzić co jest rzeźbą. Gdzie kończą się granice, które decydują o zaakceptowaniu formy jako należącej jeszcze do tej dziedziny sztuki?
Rzeźba stała się szczególnym obszarem eksploracji swoich granic. Mamy tu problem podobny do pytania o piękno - kto dziś miałby określić "ex cathedra", gdzie leżą jej granice? Rzeźba została zepchnięta na te granice poprzez nowe media, nowe dziedziny sztuki, technologie, które przesuwają jej obszar od wewnątrz i od zewnątrz. Funkcje rzeźby, które określały jej obszar zastosowania oraz instytucje, które się nią posługiwały uległy głębokim przemianom. Na przykład rzeźba pomnikowa, której mecenasem było państwo, musiała ulec przekształceniu po tak intensywnym jej wykorzystaniu przez totalitarne Niemcy, czy komunistyczną Rosję. W Polsce widzimy ciąg dalszy kryzysu w nowych odsłonach. Nie ma możliwości, aby masowy i tragiczny poziom upamiętnień papieża Jana Pawła II albo ostatnio ofiar Katastrofy Smoleńskiej nie spowodował dalszego popadania w niszę tradycyjnych form uprawiania rzeźby.
- Czy wykorzystanie rzeźby w programie komputerowym, później wydrukowanie jej na drukarce 3d nie odbiera jej autentyczności ? A co z energią, emocjami przekazywanymi w bezpośrednim kontakcie ?
Myślę, że istotne jest tu rozumienie procesu twórczego. A jest to proces po pierwsze umysłowy i tu leży klucz. Jeśli narzędzie używane jest w procesie technicznym usprawniając pracę człowieka, poza zaawansowaniem technologicznym, nie ma różnicy między drukarką 3d, a dłutami których używali Egipcjanie 5 tysięcy lat temu. Oczywiście technologia wykonania rzeźby ma bardzo istotny wpływ na końcowy efekt, jej wyraz artystyczny, ale to od dojrzałości artysty zależy świadome posługiwanie się narzędziami tak, aby końcowy efekt pokrywał się z zamierzeniem. Jesteśmy świadkami czasu, kiedy możliwości techniczne są w stanie przekroczyć granicę ludzkiego autorstwa dzieła sztuki. Mówię oczywiście o sztucznej inteligencji, która dotyka tego kluczowego momentu aktu twórczego. Najprawdopodobniej obserwujemy właśnie największe wyzwania dla świata sztuki w całej historii kultury. Czy będziemy świadkami zastąpienia przez program graficzny artysty, świadkami przegranej człowieka w tym starciu, tak jak to było w przypadku słynnego pojedynku mistrza szachowego Kasparowa z komputerem? Cóż, proszę trzymać kciuki za artystów.
- Czym dla Ciebie jest rzeźba?
Moja rzeźba? Mną... Nie potrafię odseparować mojego życia od mojej rzeźby, choć czasem bardzo bym chciał.
The Dialogue and the Touch
- touch grows on the edge of truth
Zbigniew Herbert, Touch (translated by Alissa Valles)
What is this tiny book? First of all I will define it cautiously as the story on creation. The story on acting and contemplating. On a dialogue between man - the maker and his product - work of art. On looking into, hearing into, penetrating the earthly matter and getting to know it by means of the touch. On silence which is “gathering of voices” as well as on the great time of culture.
It can be rightly said that there cannot be a dialogue between a subject and an object – between a human being and a thing. However, creation starts when wood, clay or stone stop to be just a material. When an artist hugs them by his thoughts, they stand on the doorstep of a human world and enter artistic dimension. A sculpture, that is about to come into being, is present in the material as an idea or as a shape taking form within the reluctant matter. ‘And even if the item, which is coming into being, remains silent – as claims Władysław Stróżewski – being shaped by the artist, it discloses itself each time newly, each time differently’. Thus the silent is not mute but it takes part in the exchange of meanings. „That's why I'm standing here before this column, attaching an almost human significance to it, and working on it I could compare it to working with another person, I compare it to an interpersonal relationship.”. The relationship of an artist and his work of art opens towards the past, the present and the future of culture. Act of creation each time means confronting personal experience with the experience of others both creating at present and centuries ago. Its intimate dimension is related to the identity of this particular man and artist.
The title of the essay: ‘The Meeting’ can be understood in two ways. On the one hand it is when you breast and face something, on the other one it is like a ripe fruit of a dialogue. In the first meaning the meeting signifies a kind of activity, in the second one – it is revealed as a gift. The very personal text deals both with a quest for one’s own way as well as with hardship and grace to meet.
My commentary should be discreet as this essay, although it could be independent, is a commentary after all. This text comments on a great work pictured in the photographs. The photographs are only flat reflections of the lumps permeated by the artist’s thoughts. This thought first was just an idea and now is the full – the shape of human love and the breath of stone.
Joanna Zach
The Meeting
The morning alarm goes off, disturbing my blissful sleep just like any other day. Every day except Sunday, for as long as I remember, eight o'clock has marked the hour of the brutal encounter with reality, with an awareness of the passing of time. Time, that cruel invention of man, if only I could wake up one day, to the sound of the alarm clock or even without any help from the outside world, and manage to wake a human in me who is beyond time, who except for the rhythm of his own pulse, won't be dependent on any other, even the one set by the ever escaping hand of the clock.
It is March. I'm working on a sculpture. Almost every day for the last month I have been working my way with a chisel into the cold surface of the stone in order to reveal the shape which was born in my mind. The process of getting the shape out of the granite has already lasted a month. The process of forming this idea in my head – over a year. One year after I had a vague idea in my mind, ethereal and elusive like hundreds of others before, after preserving it in the form of sketches and miniature sculptures, I've got to the final stage, I've reached the last layer, the toughest of the classical materials used by sculptors – granite.
After the time when the mind is indifferent to itself and its visions, the awakening is like opening oneself to the reality far greater than myself or my thoughts. We encounter people, we confront otherness. We meet people who are more or less favourable towards us, we maintain the relationships started during the previous stage, we start new ones. I encounter people too, though not every day. When I wake up, after switching off the alarm clock, I meet silence. A certain house with a farm 50 km outside Warsaw is a place where for a long time there has been only one person waking up. But getting up is such a problem not because there are no prospects of a meeting. On the contrary, the everyday challenge getting up results from the meeting obligation. Today I'm not going to meet any human. The stone is the reason for my resistance. The one which towers above me and yet which I've been trying to dominate. Having got out of the warm bed, I'm taking my time with all the steps of my morning routine, as if I was delighting myself with momentary peace. But then there always comes a time when you find out the tea cup is already empty, or that brushing your teeth again is probably a bit too much.
The time of the meeting is approaching inevitably. The ten steps between the house and the workshop fill the lungs with fresh, spring air smelling of nature being born anew. This has to suffice for the next few hours which I will spend wearing a painter's mask. I'm opening the door to the workshop. Still there – just as I left it the previous day – a stone column made of grey Polish granite slightly reduced at the top. If I should ever leave it, it would be frozen in this pose until the end, forever unchanged. Two hours after starting my day, I'm going to wake it up with a penetrating cut of a diamond blade. Before I do, I'm putting on a robe purchased in Jerusalem, 500 metres away from the place where the „The Righteous One'” was supposed to be killed. over my dirty working hoodie and sweatpants. Apparently, I'm also susceptible to the faith in objects, usually more so than in objects of faith. After finishing getting ready for work, not an inch of my face is visible – only the hood, the mask, the protective goggles on my eyes and earmuffs for muting the noise. I don't even recognize myself in the mirror, I am, as thousands of artists before me, builders of cathedrals, Egyptian sculptors, anonymous.
Only now, looking at the stone surface, does it hit me that time is running out, that I need to start working. I climb up the scaffolding, I'm turning on the diamond grinder. The entire blade is exposed, contrary to the precautions from the manual and common sense. I'm working without any cover, the blade gets submerged into the stone, from time to time sliding down on the surface of the hollow it has caused, so the grip holding this small tool must be very firm, almost spasmodic, any case of the machine slipping out could be catastrophic, it could mean that after the accident I would have nothing left to hold the tool with. A small grinder is easier to control, I've virtually given up the big one, it's so heavy that with my underweight physique and poor physical strength, I lose my grip fairly fast which makes it more difficult to focus on my work and forget about the safety issues than when I'm using the smaller one. Having done a series of small cuts with my grinder, I'm putting the tool away and taking a hammer and chisel - the attributes of a sculptor. At this stage they are used to chip off the cut surfaces. I'm taking off the mask, goggles and earmuffs. I shouldn't, but at least for a minute I don't want the rubber mask between us, even if it means the dust will accumulate in my lungs; I want to see the process of forming an idea out of the stone, even if it means permanently irritated eyes; I also want to hear, I need to hear the stone. The work is going very slowly, sometimes I feel like it isn't moving at all, despite more hours of the struggle; and there's nothing worse than Sisyphean labour. After several hours, already tired, but also discouraged by the slow progress, I'm starting to wonder if perhaps I don't have anything urgent on the agenda to allow me to take a break before the established dinner time at 3 p.m. An important call to make, some other, minor sculpture, which has to be completed shortly. I'm launching the escape mechanism, as always when something gets the better of me. And this isn't the first time this has happened when someone appointed a task for me, or I did it myself as an challenge I must overcome. My conscience starts calling too. Am I to go and leave the sculpture behind? It is only an object after all, a piece of rock, a piece of matter. It's true. The sculpture is an object, but it is up to a man what meaning he will assign to it. In all this struggle, I should never let myself belittle the object I'm creating, I mustn't degrade it to any level below a piece of art. If it was to happen, I would lose this battle, I wouldn't bear the weight of this job if it was worth as much as a burger at MacDonald's. That's why I'm standing here before this column, attaching an almost human significance to it, and working on it I could compare it to working with another person, I compare it to an interpersonal relationship. This may sound strange as an interpersonal relationship is after all a mutual connection. What connection should the stone have with me? And yet, every scultpure that I have worked on has been conducting a dialogue with me, in a way not always clear to me. It was a cultural dialogue, having at the background the masterpieces I had seen before, not only sculptures. But most importantly, it was a dialogue which I was conducting through touch, through a very intimate, direct sensual contact with this piece of matter. Every material which I work with is different, each is unique, but with none of them I have had such a strong feeling of personality, as I did while working with granite. So, we meet ...
The Stone
(...)
it wasn’t at all the idea of invariability the stone
was changeable lazy in the sunshine brightened like the moon
at the approach of a storm it became dark slate like a cloud
then greedily drank the rain and this wrestling with water
sweet annihilation the struggle of forces clash of elements
the loss of one’s own nature drunken stability
were both beautiful and humiliating
(...)
Zbigniew Herbert, Sense of Identity (translated by John and Bogdana Carpenter)
For thousands of years sculptors created their art from natural materials which were supplied by earth – they sculptured in stone, moulded from clay, carved wood, cast out of metals possessed from the earth. After the great industrial revolution, followed by further progress in the field of science, they started discovering new materials, the man-made ones, such as plastic, rubber or concrete. It is only natural that contemporary artists have started employing these new materials in their work. Technology has always assisted a man, has always served art, enhancing human capabilities. Tens of thousands of years of culture has been a period of remarkable technological discoveries. The Egyptian sculptors from five millennia ago would give a lot to be able to use an angle grinder for shaping their basalt monuments. I wonder if there is any line regarding the application of the new technologies and materials which shouldn't be crossed for the sake of the quality of the manufactured art pieces. Doesn't the ability to design a sculpture in a computer programme, and then printing it using a 3D printer take away some authenticity from the work of art? I do not know. After all, since the beginning of time, there have always been tools standing between man and his creation. Personally, perhaps because I have been educated on the works of old masters, I feel best working with classical materials such as clay or stone. I feel uneasy about the new advancements, I'm afraid man might not keep up. I'm concerned, probably not less than people were when the Gutenberg's invention was being introduced. Still, I myself use electrical tools, which improve my stone working, I also apply chemical products to solidify sculptures which have been hand-made in clay. Refusing to use new technologies and materials would be like insisting on rewriting volumes by hand after the introduction of movable type. But even though I am a user of these tools and materials, I'm still a nature lover, so the closer I am to natural materials, the less I am separated from them, the closer I am to myself. Therefore, I'm asking myself, why? The first instinct is to answer, that's probably because I – a human – was also created by nature. Science says that I was created as a result of evolution, through multiple transformations of organisms adapting to their habitats for hundreds of thousands of years. At the end of this journey is a human being. I come from my mother's womb. But there is another version, found in literature, old Hebrew or Greek texts concerning the creation of men. In the Biblical book of Genesis, the Creator made man in his image, created him from the dust of the earth and gave him the breath of life. Thus, clay has its own Old Testament lineage. The prototype of a sculptor is God, and the material is clay. In the hands of the Creator the clay is given its personality, it is turned into a person. This symbolic description hides an extremely important truth about humanity. A man is a flexible material, whose personality, his psyche change according to the experiences he goes through, and the decisions he makes. He creates himself. (I was told by a psychology graduate, that on their first class of their studies, they are given a piece of clay; I don't suppose this exercise is about practising manual skills ...)
Is there a place for stone in the description of the Creation? I can't find it in the Book of Genesis. So I reach for the Greek mythology. There is a description of the creation of man by Titan Prometheus. He creates mankind from clay mixed with spring water. But, the human race is perished as a result of the wrath of the Olympian gods.
However, Prometheus makes an attempt to bring humans to life. This time he chooses a different material. He orders the couple of survivors from the destruction of mankind to take their mother's bones in their hands and throw them over their shoulders. What do these bones symbolise? - the Mother is Earth and the stones are her bones. From the scattered stones, the human is born. Why should stone, a symbol of strength, stability and permanence, be the material of which humanity was created? - Looking at the photos from my early childhood, I wonder how much of that little man I once was is still there in me. This skin I live in keeps changing every day – that which came from dust and to dust will return. Panta rei, and so, clay it is. To what extent is man immutable? In the earthly sense he is indeed subject to constant transformations, so perhaps the answer lies in the extra-terrestrial life. It would be closer to the Christian belief, according to which the human soul is created before conception and endures after death. Thus, human life is like this pillar of time beyond time – it is of course a question of faith. It seem to me, however, that the author of the myth about Prometheus was rather referring to man's personality, his strength. Before the destruction of mankind by Zeus and other gods, man was weak, dependent on the world in which he lived, but after being reborn from the stones the human race conquered the world, his genius helped him subordinate his environment. Hence, the connection with stone. This isn't, however, an interpretation which could convince me. Man is so easy to break... Without the society, without the inventions collected over the course of centuries, he is naked, funny - „that is man”. So if I was to identify with the stone, it would rather be through the sense of duration, through God's will, (in which I believe or which I question); undoubtedly, also through being part of the generational chain, or of the cultural one. It's also due to the irreversibility of every work done in this material: when I take clay into my hands, I can easily correct any mistake, undo any decision I've made. Working with stone, everything I do is final, as in life, where every decision, every situation which has arisen, is irreversible; thus, stone teaches one humility towards time, it also teaches scrupulousness, and certain seriousness in decision-making. So, it isn't toughness that connects me to it, it is actually what makes us different. Unless I take a look at my own hands, which resemble the still delicate hands of a pianist, which do harden when in contact with a harder material. I do harden in the process of meeting hard matter. Will I ever become like this rock? So it is a mutual relationship – I change, the stone changes, still being reduced by slightly hesitant movements of the chisel. Stone, especially one as hard as granite, resembles a separate entity, more than any other material, since it seems to possess its own will. I need and want to leave some space for this will of the matter which I'm co-creating with. I have my vision of the prism, which I want to implement by ablating the redundant material. The stone aims at synthesis. If it was allowed so, it would definitely remain nestled in the flank of the mother mountain. If it only could, it would remain in the shape of the pre-carved block. If it only could, it would live on locked away out of time's reach, undistinguished. However, our encounter takes place, a meeting between two worlds. Twenty-three years after my birth and almost three hundred million years after the formation of the rocks of the Strzegom Massif in the vicinity of the Polish Sudeten mountains. Two hundred and ninety million years! You witnessed the Earth being born! Did you see the hand of the Creator separating the light from the darkness? Did you see Him separate the waters under the firmament from the ones above? Did you see the beginnings of plants and living beings? Were you a witness to the first actions of man in the image of the Creator? Did you see the origins of culture? I stand here before you with a tool in my hand to bring you into this area of culture. Did you hear Adam calling out creatures from the realm of the unconscious, giving them names? Today I am calling you by name, redefining your destiny...
Wrestling with God
So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.” But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”
Genesis
Looking at the story behind this sculpture, I wonder how much to say I have in what my art is like. It is, of course, a question accompanied by a reflection on human life, human freedom. These questions have been asked for ages, we know them from literary history, where we can hear this historical reflection expressed through the voices of Job, Faustus or Forrest Gump, asking if it is us who decide, or if perhaps we are nothing but a feather cast by the force of elements – testing the balance between them and us. In terms of my sculpture, it reminds me of Jacob from the Old Testament, one of the fathers of Israel – after whom the chosen people were named. The Book of Genesis includes a powerful description of e battle Jacob fought with God, which shows in a very particular way, man's struggle with the Creator. So why do I talk about my sculpture in the context of this story? I remember the time when I was making the decision about the theme of the sculpture, I remember what an important factor it was to leave the sacred theme out of the projects that I was considering. In a way, I had an intention of expanding the issues I addressed, expand the range of cultural contexts I've covered so far. In recent years the following sculptures have been created, „Eve”, showing the foremother, her old body fading away, disappearing into a tree, at whose trunk she started recognizing good and evil. Soon after this, another one was made, „The Voice of someone calling in the dessert” - a figure of a speaking prophet. The following year, after John the Baptist, I carved a couple from the garden of Eden – 'Adam and Eve', sculptures telling a story of woman and man, of birth, creation and suffering. In the meantime, in years 2010-2012 a very special sculpture was made, very personal to me and most important one so far – the Katyń-Smoleńsk monument. Completed in exactly two years, it was unveiled in a baroque, old town St. Anne's Church in Warsaw.
Another pretext to pondering the mystery of the phenomenon called time – two years: on the one hand, only a fraction of time, on the other, an epoch. When I had my first meeting concerning the sculpture with Father Rector of that church, I was only twenty years old, having in mind a very recent experience of losing my father in the air crash of the presidential plane in Russia. This event, that I was to put into a spatial form, I chose to express in the form of a prayer, which I materialized with the help of bronze – the rising trees, one of them broken, and then between and above them the tree of the cross. Few people know that the monument is titled „Ave Crux,” which means this was, in my intention, another religious sculpture. In response to the painful experiences associated with the monument as well as the entire context of its creation, I decided that I will not create another sacral sculpture in the near future. I wanted to dedicate my next work to the issue of c r e a t i o n , extending the subject matter to include the other major source of the western culture, the Greek mythology. I selected the theme of „The Birth of Venus”, which – I have to admit – in comparison with my earlier works, seems to be a thoroughly pagan topic. From undefined matter emerges the body of a young woman in embryonic pose, who looks as if she was waking up from her sleep. This sculpture was meant to be different than the previous works; possessing a certain kind of stigma of human suffering, Venus waking up to life, in her expression is reminiscent of „The Dawn” by Michelangelo from the Medici chapel, but it also has a very strong erotic tinge.
I was also considering writing a script for a film about a lonely sculptor, who falls in love with his creation, a somewhat contemporary Pygmalion. Fulfilling his love to the sculpture doesn't end in Athena's verdict, but schizophrenia, which leaves him in the arms of his lover, created by his imagination. The film was to have a happy ending – the artist spends his remaining days in a mental hospital, where he fulfils his love for the eternally young and faithful vision of beauty, which is only interrupted by his death. Returning to the issue of the sculpture – it also constituted the resignation of the Judeo-Christian idea of sacrum. Would it be possible to make this nude beauty with a face of a famous Polish model, who doesn't shy away from showing her curves, pass for a religious sculpture? This is a scenario I couldn't have imagined, so spreading my hands with an expression of resignation and defeat, but also admiration, I raise my head and look at the starry sky above. The sculpture was conceived to be realized in stone, but before selecting the stone I had to fix it in resin – the plastic which is loathed by me. Since the material chosen as the stone was supposed to be white marble, I wanted to distinguish the cast sculpture by making it a darker colour, so as the filler for the resin I selected bronze powder and predominantly black soil (because it's easily accessible, cheap and when used in a large amount it eliminates the impression of artificiality of the material.)
I've made a reference to the story of Jacob who did wrestling with God himself, so if there are any rules in this competition, it was a hit which could be compared to hip joint dislocation – anyone who knows literature even only a little will agree that the earthy surface of the sculpture has nothing to do with sea foam, and that I should be praised for my consistency in reaching for Biblical themes – let me introduce the third version of Eve! One could point out the last resort in the form of marble – let me answer by spreading my hands, my gaze fixed on a distant and inscrutable sky. Despite many attempts it was not possible to raise the funds for this, how very precious, ore. The marble I chose was the perfect match for the sculpture, shipped to Poland from a Greek island of Thassos (what a cultural context!). Michelangelo used to say that a sculpture already exists within the structure of the stone, all you need to do is get rid of the redundant elements – my Venus will be asleep in this beautiful Greek marble, will remain unawake until they will turn her into floor tiles for a luxurious bathroom in a shopping centre. „Sacrum creation is in templo di consumptio”, it is the inscription which was supposed to appear under a sculpture which I wanted to place in a shopping centre – it was meant as a deliberate reflection on the act of creation in the atmosphere of consumer hustle and bustle. Knowing that creating the sculpture I wanted would be impossible, I had to find a theme which would be both familiar to me and which I would be able to make from the material available, which turned out to be a block of grey Polish granite. One of the projects which I had done before suited the size of the block. The sculpture which I came up with after the experiences surrounding the monument, speaks about faith and God, who also exists in the context of faith, as seen through the figure of Virgin Mary.
Before I made the decision of prepping it for the realisation, however, I captured it in two sketches, one on paper and the other in ceramic made on commission as a design for a grave sculpture. Finally, convinced about the validity of this theme, of its actuality, I begin working on „Empty Pieta.” First of all, I made a few more outlines in ceramic, including a preparatory nude. Then, I made the life-sized nude in clay, trying out lots of variants of the hand settings. I was trying to find as much synthesis in the human body as possible, without taking away the right proportions and shapes from the carved form; I wanted to find the golden mean, the balance between the idea of „less is more”, and capturing the beauty of the female body as thoroughly as possible. The nude has prepared me for carving the target design which I was only to sculpt in stone later. This project was being completed at my own place, in a very poorly heated basement, in a period between January and March. Despite the preparatory nude done prior to this, I approached the anatomy very loosely, the robes covering the body are very independent, the gestures have changed as well – instead of the right hand placed on chest and the left one lowered in a gesture of consent similar to the one made by Mary from the Vatican Pieta, in this new concept both arms are raised, one in a gesture of openness, the other with a clenched fist. At this stage, the sculpture received a new name - „The Cathedral.” There isn't any room left for the study of the human form, there is a form in the expression of thoughts and emotions, there are vertical lines, structuring the composition in a similar way that the verticality of the trees from the monument does. From these vertical lines emerges a figure, her face; I approached Mary's face as a form within an arrangement of other forms. Her face turned out to be a sensitive point, since I have approached the entire figure almost abstractly. There was a risk that its expressiveness will define the whole character of the sculpture – one change of detail, like moving the corner of the mouth a fraction of a millimetre up, and the entire sculpture gained an optimistic character, moving it slightly down resulted in a mournful expression. Therefore, the first objective in order to define the sculpture's character was for me to achieve the mysterious expression, it was to correspond to the shadow, to the kind of delta shape between the two 'towers' formed by the raised hands; the second one was to make reference to the symbol which Mary's face constitutes in Eastern art, the icon painting tradition. Hence, I studied predominantly the works of Rublov as well as the image of Our Lady of Włodzimierz. Although I couldn't say precisely which images from the Polish tradition I used as my inspiration, I wanted this sculpture to express that characteristic space in our culture which combines Eastern and Western influences – iconicity with slenderness of the Gothic style. After the completion of the sculpture, I planned a cast of resin, this time mixed with soot and copper. After preparing the samples, from underneath the charcoal-black surface a golden glow was supposed to show. The samples came out excellent, after rubbing them off with acid, a greenish coating of the patinating copper was to appear. I don't know what exactly went wrong. There is a whole series of factors and steps which need to be made with great care while performing a cast of a sculpture, like dividing the sculpture, splattering the clay with plaster, reinforcing the cast negative, removing the negative, impregnating and waxing the negative, coating it with the right material - resin. After that, you need to break the negative in order to reveal the desired sculpture. Just imagine the despair I felt when during the forging the shell of the sculpture, its first layer, was falling off along the plaster fragments. The moment when a sculpture emerges from behind the negative is an experience close to witnessing a birth – when, after many months of carving, the figure disappears behind the empty space of the cast mould, its reappearance is accompanied by the joy of meeting again. This time, the ruined surface of the sculpture had to obscure the yearned image which had arisen in the course of a few months. It's a situation which resembles a departure of a loved one – the worst thing about it though is that you can't even take time to process it - another stone was waiting and a tight deadline had to be met. Wrestling with God can be very painful, but you can't show your weakness, you need to keep facing Him, not to defeat Him, but to challenge yourself.
The symphony of lumps
(...)
Though every man in him has beauty's shadow
And each – each one of us is the beauty's dust
Should he save it in his conscience clean and pure
And told the granite log: “live as my life's cast”.
The granite would have seen itself obscure
and tried to finger-wipe its stony eyelids
like a far lands' man awakened from silence
But that's what he would do to the granite block
while another to the rainbow shed on wall
and another might have inclined the trees' flock
to make them clasp their hands into scaffold scroll
And yet another one the voice's column
whould throw to cords of psalms so wise and solemn
unwrapping like a resurrected matter
which gets ravished to heaven; the soul would fly
there – there – and the canvas would be falling scattered
like an autumn leaf when the pear fruit is ripe.
(...)
Cyprian Kamil Norwid, Promethidion (translated by Aleksandra Niemirycz)
How many times in the moments of doubts have I questioned the decision of becoming ”a sculptor the artist”? How many times, having been looking at hurting hands tired of hitting with a hammer, having been unable to wash the dried up resin out of them or simply when I was totally exhausted? When I look at my fragile body I wonder why I chose sculptures as if it was in opposition to this weak body and I still cannot understand this childish at that time decision. Maybe because I have always wanted to act defiantly or because I had to prove something to myself? Each time I listen to a wonderful piece of music by Chopin or Górecki I ask myself why I have not chosen this path of career. Or when I watch deeply moving films by Terrence Mallick or Polański I understand I could have tried to become a director. When I read a novel by Tomasz Mann or Albert Camus I wonder if I would be more understandable as a writer than as a sculptor. It is said that some people are talented at playing the piano while some others at calculating. However, I am inclined to agree with Picasso who thought that the final outcome of a piece of art is constituted by 5% of talent whereas the rest is passion combined with work. I would not increase the percentage value of talent. I am puzzled by the forgotten in culture notion of beauty. Are there any objective principles which give the right to describe a piece of art as beautiful? Are there any principles beyond all the art genres which would define paintings together with literary and film works of art? While working on The Cathedral one question about the composition was constantly coming back to my mind. It was a question of such a form arrangement which would ensure harmony or even coherence of various art genres. Very early, at the age of 19, when I was sculpting the portrait of Chopin, I was listening to his music and tried to sculpt the sounds on his coat. The first attempts were hilarious as I strived to transform the rhythms into the language of sculpture. They were whole series of sounds resembling pearls being thrown onto the stairs. Recently, I have also read a book titled ”Doctor Faust” by Tomasz Mann in which he describes the life of an ingenious composer Adrian Leverkuhn. Once, the musician discovers the music sequence which he calls ”haetera esmeralda”. It is a system based on Math logic with notes which are ordered in a way that none of them is left behind in the system and each is essential to build a composition. From that moment on I have been wondering if such a system would exist in sculpting so that every level and every detail would be essential in a composition. I am sure that there are some principles prevailing to all the areas and the most significant one is the law of coherence of the form and expression; the law of completeness. The Cathedral was built basing on the rule of contrasts. Large levels together with details and the rhythms of levels along with contrasts between texture played a significant role. A human figure in robes constituted only a pretext to raising a question of a theme as a form system. Lately, I have been reading a course book on how to write a script where the author tried to convince that constant plot twists to a large extent make a film worthy. Namely, they are contrasts. This rule of contrasts seems to be natural and it originates from the way we assess the encountered reality. We say that something is big because we juxtapose it with something smaller. We describe it by comparing it with other objects. People easily perceive the reality via relativisation. When an artist creates a work of art, regardless if it is a novel, a symphony, a drawing or a sculpture, they create their own relations between the elements. It is a closed world, yet only partly. How do we know that the first part of ”Autumn” by Vivaldi is fast? If we compare it with the rhythm of a fast running tractor, the introduction by Vivaldi will transpire to be slow. However, when we listen to it, we receive the rhythm in a different way. Or when we look at the proportions of the Empire State Building, why do we claim the building is longitudinal? The answer to the question is to be found in ourselves. A human body is an archetype for our perception. As far as rhythms are concerned, the proper one, which is neither too fast nor too slow, is to be heard while checking our blood pressure. Similarly, the proportions of the skyscraper are assessed this way, not the other, because the proportions of a human body are of this kind, not the other. Like me, I less or more consciously define proportions and rhythms of an object being created. Namely, it is according to the certain principles prevailing beyond the object and to the ones defined within it. That is why, even though I try to take a sculpture such as The Cathedral as a set of abstract forms joined in a figurative depiction, I do not think any work of art made by a human can be acknowledged as completely abstract. Even Pollock created his canvas according to the patterns taken from ”our” world and his compositions are so abstract as far as musical compositions are not figurative. A man, on the other hand, only to some extent can explain the origin of forms in culture. Can we put them under evaluation? From the dawn of history we define what is beautiful according to a variety of criteria. Can we state objectively that some period was closer to beauty than the other? If I asked what a classical Greek sculptor would associate with beauty, there would be a one-word answer: harmony. If I could ask this question to the creators of the cathedral in Reims, they would surely indicate the vast surfaces of stained glass windows decorating the temple and I would understand that they see beauty in God embodied in the light. While taking a stroll around one of French Revolution squares in Paris and asking such a question I could provoke an argument between a classic and a romantic over beauty: if it is more embraced in the genius of human mind or if it is closer to sublime of human feelings.
All the epochs amaze with the richness of wonderful forms and I would not dare to choose one which is closer to the ideal. Yet, a man still looks for the ultimate answer, the proper one. One should search for it beyond time, ask those who are not involved in history, those who stand in front of the history gate while holding the commencing part of the history and culture chain in hands. Therefore, following the poet I will ask ”the eternal human” - Prometheus Adam: ”What do you know about the beauty? - It is of a love shape.” Thus, I would look for the good, truth and beauty in Plato's collation. Indeed, there is some truth in the combination of the good and beauty. Can this be related to my sculpture? I do not know – I blindly look for the answer to these eternal questions, seeing myself merely at the foot of the Sisyphean mountain, being aware that each time I will find the answer similar to the peak of the mountain, the questions as stones will fall down waiting at the mountainside for the effort to be taken anew.
The Empty Pieta
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.
Luke 24;1-3
What an amazing topic for an artist is crucifix – Human-God hung on the cross, which is a torture tool. Almighty God sentenced by the human verdict. The most moving moment is when he calls during his crucifixion: ”My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”. He who is God himself. It is far human. Can I imagine this moment, these emotions, this drama? A man tries to equate and understand the character. Maybe it is easier to understand Saint Mary and her dimension of suffering. Can there be anything more heart-rending than the depiction of Mother embracing the mistreated body of her son? How much touching are Michelangelo’s interpretations of this theme? Vatican Pieta seems to be materialised harmony and her depiction in its purest form. Whereas Rondanini Pieta is a depiction of a pure relation, the saint relation. Surely, the sacrum sphere is something so much unbelievable and indefinite as a mystery. I also wanted to raise the issue, yet I was stopped by the character of Jesus Christ. It would be difficult to sculpt a defined God while the only attribute I am sure of as far as God is concerned is a mystery and the only cognitive criterion with reference to Him is faith. That is why, as in the case of Smoleńsk epitaph, I preferred to use certain symbols. In ”Ave Crux” I did not want to literally depict human death or a crashed plane, which the epitaph was about. Also in The Cathedral, speaking of God, I did not intend to present him in a literal way. Pieta is a depiction which originates in Evangel. Yet, it does not occur literally in its pages. There is no description of Mother holding the body of her Son. There is one certain dramatic moment, which has not been ever mentioned by any evangelist. Namely, I imagined women – three Marys, among whose there is Jesus Christ's Mother, who all came to the grave to wash Jesus Christ but the body was not there. Let us imagine a moment before Angels who declared the Resurrection appeared. Let us imagine their faith being put to the test. I can identify with them and probably everybody who does not stay in a mystical contact with God, everybody who does not experience a miracle on a daily basis, everybody for whom every day constitutes new effort of seeking the truth, could do so, too. The situation when Jesus Christ's body cannot be found and no evidence can be found is a situation I can find myself in – I also cannot touch him. That is why my Pieta, my Empty Pieta presents Mary with a shroud which was used to wrap the body of her son. Now it is also her who cannot touch him. She is holding the canvas in both hands in a gesture of an orant, leaning forward to look deeper into this matter and therefore to take a deep look into herself. She – the first Christian, probably discerns God there. Looking at the stone verticals expressing the shroud, with the eyes of faith one can notice the presence of God. One can also look at the stone as at the matter which there is nothing behind and imagine Mary who enters the grave only to let her hands be filled with the matter which is not the outcome of Creation. One can imagine Mary who will never see her Son again. It is also possible to perceive the matter treating it as a curtain covering certain truth. One can immerse into the reflection and constantly discover, discover anew that this is M y s t e r y!
Ecclesia
The twenty-first century will be spiritual or it will not be.
André Malraux
A mystery. Not a very popular notion. In a time of science which explains everything, which claims the right to explain all the cause-and-effect sequence of the world. A human starts to replace comprehending and experiencing the world through believing in God with the science which explains phenomena and processes occurring in nature. God becomes needless. Friedrich Nietzsche long before World War II wrote that ”God is dead”. He wrote it not only as an atheist but in the context of the Western societies who rejected the idea of God along with its principles and virtues. It can be said that for a philosopher God existed and lived in a collective human awareness which nurtured the idea of God and lived it. God's death does not result in His ”physical death”- this death occurs in a human awareness. It is a result of secularisation of societies. At present I observe, from the perspective of the 21st century. and reckon that Nietzsche was partly right. He was right back then. However, he saw the chance for humanity in replacing the foregoing Christian virtues with the new ones which would express human nature in a more complete way. And he was mistaken. He did not live to see WWII which ferociously disclosed what ''human nature'' can lead to. After it finished in this part of Europe we went through socialism which is the ideology where there is no room for God and after the system changed, we entered new areas of comprehending the world, so called postmodernism, characterized by subjectivism, relativism, and the lack of faith in grand narrations and ideals, which started to flourish right after the end of WWII to the west from Communist Bloc. Needless to say, the first idea doomed to relativisation was the idea of God. It reclined at the core of the whole Western civilization order. I refer to this as it is vital for this sculpture, for The Cathedral, what social-cultural context it came into existence at. Firstly, this sculpture is a reaction to my own quests, to my searching for Mystery, but also to great absence, to Great Absent, who is God in our cultural space in the art, philosophy and science mainstreams. Two thousand years ago Human-God was dying being crucified. Then, his death was supposed to become the initial phase of a new life, which is a question of faith. Yet, there is no doubt that Jesus Christ's death became the beginning of wonderful culture, civilization, which revolutionised an attitude towards a man. It made himself valuable. Today Jesus Christ dies again. New gods are being born. They spring up like mushrooms on the ground of new laws of consumptive societies, on the ground of new custom and cultural laws constituted by the way global societies operate. I wonder whether in the mass awareness, whether on the grounds these new culture functions, Christianity will survive, whether Christ will have the right to co-exist together with new gods, whether the new god who is a man himself as an entity will let the old God in real terms collaborate in creating the new reality, whether the Internet which forms the massive consciousness, being an accidental and unstructured culture encyclopaedia, will be able to call for dying God, for universal virtues which He granted, for the differentiation between the good and bad. The new religions are far more forthcoming, significantly more attractive. They offer equality in a sense anybody can understand his or her own way. They offer freedom in a sense as anybody likes. Thus, it would seem that the new gods are salvation from the Old One, that the felonies committed by the Cross over centuries will not be repeated by those under the aegis of relativism. The greatest concern which strikes me about ''the new religions'' of fluent modernity is that these ''religions'' destroy the sense of sacrum. Christianity put a man higher than anyone else in the past because of God's entrance into the human world, through the kind of brotherhood and through baptism it incorporated a man into sacrum. It gave a completely different meaning to it than one may think explaining his existence by being connected solely to nature and to the theory of evolution. I am afraid of demotion of a man connected only with materialised and biological attitude to him and of its outcomes. I also worry about the culture which is deconsecrated, deprived of the mystery sphere, the sacred mystery, which demands respect only because it exists and it exists in such a collective awareness system and which protects, protects a man, most of all.
The life and death of art
The work of art expresses precisely those things which do not die.
Constantin Brancusi
Referring to the pages preceding this statement, I wonder about the correlation between philosophy and art. Philosophy is explaining the reality, subordinating and naming it. So is art which constitutes naming human creations that a man himself makes in the reality image and likeness. So far philosophy appeared to me as the mother of all the sciences, as a point of reference to them, as a general sphere of human considerations being a point of reference to arranging the conceptual and meaningful space and to other art genres. Art has always been as if alongside, independent in some sense, as a human activity domain. Surely, science as well as philosophy at times interchanged with certain artists' work, but art has always been able to exist and do without science. Looking at the times I create and live in and at aestheticians’ or art philosophers’' efforts, although to a minor extent but still being able to view the outcomes of their efforts, I see how much it is crucial to nurture the relationship. It seems to me that this relationship is now more important than ever, taking into account thin borders of notions, art chaos connected to breaking the subculture borders as well as to moving on to almost ''space'', overwhelming global culture sphere. Such a kind of brotherhood between a philosopher and an artist is essential mainly in order to make the stream of a human activity called art resurge.
I sometimes go to the church garden of Visitants to take a look at The Cathedral. A little bit out of longing, a little bit out of curiosity if it changes in any way according to passing seasons. Its nature has changed since I put the sculpting tools away. A chisel of human thought is of a different nature than steel – metal which enabled to give a new meaning to this stone. Yet, similarly to a child who is given a life by his mother and needs energy to survive, every work of art requires a kind of energy to endure, as well. This energy is just a human thought, a reflection in consciousness, memory. This is the way my sculpture The Cathedral exists. I also visit the garden to watch people's reactions, recipients, to my interpretation of Pieta. They are different. The ''empty'', undefined face of ''Empty Pieta'' lets a man who looks straight into her eyes be reflected as in a mirror. This enclosure leaves an area for a dialogue, independent of me. Here is what I left – a sculpture with a million faces with a potentially indefinite amount of meanings and senses. Is my intention, message at all meaningful to an ultimate reception, which is a way a work of art will live in human consciousness? I believe that the sense given by the author is similar to a seed, includes DNA, meaning code or even maybe interpretational one. But the question if a tree with tremendous boughs of theory and interpretation will grow from it and if this tree will give out further seeds of future works of art inspired by the archetype, is out of the artist's reach. It may well happen that a planted seed does not grow. The soil is the society, understood not only as a group of people possessing collective consciousness, but understood mostly as a collection of entities, independent beings, one might say, independent worlds. On two parallel roads a work of art reminds of its existence, on the road of physical being along with the road of human consciousness.
Man, just like other organisms, gives life to future generations; in this way the one who has passed away lives on inside the one who follows. Art is the second way, after religion, of defeating time, of man surpassing the phenomenon of transience, which distinguishes us from other animals. You might say, then, that art and man cannot function without each other – a human being wouldn't be this distinguished creature among countless species of plants and animals, if it wasn't for consciousness, of which art is a unique sign in the scale of the entire natural environment. Therefore, talking about the death of art or the death of man is premature – as long as some form of our creation remains in the consciousness of even a single person, the chain of culture will be preserved. Only some forms of art are dying out, styles fade out, the continuation of tradition is interrupted here and there, cannons of beauty change, there are times when beauty can be even questioned as a necessary quality of a work of art, but in spite of all that, all of us - that is, every person even remotely in touch with the form of culture known as art, we remain as human beings, as Prometheus-Adam, in a stream of ever-changing reality, whose art, styles corresponding to a particular epoch, is a reflection – therefore, time is not only a tangle of intentions, it's also a linear.
In today's discourse on the condition of art, the notion of death needs to be distinguished from the notion of crisis – which I understand as a breakthrough period, a kind of solstice – in my opinion far more in line with the contemporary processes and transformations – since art is the mirror of reality, its crisis simply follows the crisis of its times. The crisis of values of the Western world is followed by the crisis of beauty, lack of common reference points, and moral and conceptual relativism are followed by the loss of all pre-existing aesthetic criteria in our Western culture. These criteria were once the responsibility of cultural institutions, most often associated with the centres of power and the church; the art coming out of their patronage was not always of the highest standing, but, nevertheless, the system in which those criteria were decided or at least reviewed by people who were prepared to issue aesthetic judgment was more certain than the one in which the power over such judgments has been so largely taken over by mechanisms related to the free market – like the law of money and democratic mechanisms – and there's nothing worse for the quality of art than democracy, especially when the society is unprepared to take part in such a discourse. A rebellion against those mechanisms would be a Don Quixote's fight – within the Western democracies, it's impossible to have control over the entire field of culture and art while respecting the rights of an individual. It must be remembered that the so-called high culture has always been elitist, it's expression could have some influence on society, but not vice versa, you must mind these dependencies, it must be ensured that „it isn't beautiful what you like, but what should be liked”.
It could be said that art is merely a mirror, that it's just a mirage, or that it's a sign of man's weakness, his inability to cope with reality, that it's creating phantoms. This mirror, however, although it might not reflect the whole truth, is one of the greatest creations or phenomena related to human activity, next to the capacity for empathy, love of another and the ability to give life. This mirror creates a platform, perhaps magical, not as real as a sensual touch of the object existing in the common reality, but a platform for meeting the man from the past, with the whole world which got engraved in the consciousness of that man. Someone might say, for instance, that my meeting with Michelangelo is an illusion, is not real, because that man died five centuries ago, he no longer exists and it's impossible to meet him. I don't take away the right from anyone to interpret reality in such a way, but to me the chain of culture and tradition is very much alive, even r e v i v i n g that which belongs to the past, so I do meet Michelangelo through the objects he created, the objects called works of art. This meeting happens both on a spiritual and a material level. First of all, he exists in my consciousness through his creation. Secondly, being one of many artists inspired by his work, with every sculpture I create which he has had impact on, I include him in this l i v i n g o r g a n i s m, the chain of tradition.
Perhaps that is why I have chosen sculpture. It was forced out to the end of the hierarchy of arts by Hegel as it is so tightly related to the matter. It was the philosopher’s mistake not to promote both of the dimensions that should be integral to the work of art. The material aspect reflects the spiritual dimension and the mere spiritual aspect constitutes the expression of work of art and transgresses the medium by which it could have come into being. The phenomenon of sculpture consists in the fact that due to its relation to the matter it is not limited to its spiritual expression. Apparently, sculpture is undergoing crisis – it is no more as popular as it used to be in the past. A lot of sculpture’s roles have been taken over by the new media born in the nineteenth and twentieth century. It is also a victim of the contemporary chaos of notions. It is hardly possible to specify where sculpture starts and where it ends as well as which forms belong to it or transgress it. It doesn’t mean, however, that it has been dying – it has been truthfully transforming and reflecting the present, a contemporary man and the flow of post-modernist time. After all, this medium is exceptional and outstanding. Sculpture as no other domain of art enables us to meet, to touch, to confirm sensually its own existence and no other sense allows such confirmation. Just like Thomas I can verify its existence. No other domain of art shall confirm to such extent the truth of Incarnate Word, that l o g o s, the human thought, has become of the m a t t e r.
Looking back at the history I can see the story of passing and replacing of the old by the new. People pass, the new ones come, civilizations and gods together with their religions elapse and are substituted by the new, stronger ones. Time flies wiping out the precarious stuff. Only relics of the past, traces of the cultures - objects and words harder than stone - remain. I look with respect at the column made of rock – the trace of my ‘wrestling’. It has witnessed so many epochs before my time, shall it see another ones? Shall this mark of human thought which breathed life into stone be read by a human of the future and shall it transfer to the future some values that can endure?
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In 2017 thanks to the efforts made by Wanda Traczyk-Stawska alias “Pączek” who was an insurgent in Warsaw Uprising as well as by priest Aleksander Seniuk the sculpture was placed in the park in the Wola district of Warsaw next to Warsaw Insurgents Cemetery in order to commemorate insurgents’ mothers. There has been an inscription ‘MOTHER’ forged on the pedestal in four languages of conflicted nations: Polish, German, Russian and Hebrew.