The idea of the set of graphics emerged cognately with the series An organism called a city (2007-2011) and proceeded from acclimation to a new dwelling place. Titular room was nothing but an isolated part of a flat in the centre of Katowice which became a place enabling me to watch the city infrastructure. Since the beginning of my work I concentrated on interpretational possibilities, waiving an unambiguous picture of the motives observed. I tried to avoid reconstructing the city architecture precisely and analysing the same motifs, I edited the constructions designed by the architects in a new way. An important assumption for the cycle was the idea to redefine the existing reality and to create a space which in theory formed a parallel world. As in my former graphic realisations I turned away from figuration or presenting man in a literal manner; I replaced it with a symbolic method just indicating his existence. This cycle has also another characteristic feature that is presenting the process of surroundings cognition through constructing an individual identity on the basis of identification and reading appropriate culture codes.
I would like to describe the cycle starting from the graphic entitled 65m2. It was not created as the first realization but is crucial as far as the whole cycle is concerned. What is more, it also related to the artworks created in 2009-2010: 10m2 and 25m2. As with the two just mentioned, it refers to the dwelling place – a secure space, enclosed from housing infrastructure. It concerns a place occupied and organized in such a way as to satisfy one of the most important needs in the human hierarchy – the necessity of safety and coming into existence in a social area. I would define this graphic as the central point around which I have determined a radius and at the same time the range of my exploration. This is an example of a realisation within a particular artwork in which the attempt to stigmatise my own existence in the creative space became important to me. In these works I have become an observer being observed at the same time, thereby being submitted to contextual analysis and having accepted it. This type of self-reflection approach I have applied quite often, adopting it as a way of monitoring myself and then interpreting my own behaviour. The comments have turned into plastic traces left in the space of graphics, becoming a proof of my presence and an element of the process of identification and building a relationship with place.
Succession of this activity is visible in another chapter of the cycle in graphics entitled Yesterday’s children and The marked area. In both realisations the idea was carried through the traces marked as signs directly relevant to street art and graffiti style. I have decided to apply this convention as the mechanism of creating graffiti in the city space because, although it seldom carries any artistic value, it is an interesting example of an attempt to manifest the presence of an individual or a group in a sociological aspect. I applied the mechanism of traces left by the author of the work to my graphic reality world. I marked selected fragments of the city architecture with a kind of lettering stylistically referring to graffiti. Complemented with additional thematic motifs, they became a symbolic medium of personal meaning. In that, I was able not only to intervene in the conventional manner in the city space but also to stress matters important to me and, to a certain extent, deepen the process of identifying with the surroundings.
The series Another way comprising six graphics is an important succession in the context of the whole summary. The first sequence (Another way I) initiated the whole set and the implications in following realisations paralleled the work on the other parts of the cycle, being modified over time. Most of the artworks contained in the series Another Way refer directly to architectural sites existing in Katowice: a busy intersection (Another way II, Another way II – night) or to religious edifices (Another way III and IV). The reason to create these images derived from cityscape observation. The idea comprised also an attempt to transform the objects; their real structure was analysed and converted into a different one. The model existing in reality took the form of its equivalent existing in a simultaneously created space. The idea of a parallel world accepted for my own artistic captive use, is at this moment important to me as it accompanies most of my realizations. By neglecting to literally render reality, I concentrate on creating it in a new way, based on authenticity. I had an opportunity to present all the series Another way on an individual exhibition at Ateneum Gallery in 2015. The exhibition of the graphics was accompanied by Dr Sebastian Dzudzik’s publication entitled The magnetic power of the centre and architectural topography of the world.
The reviewer discussed the chosen part of the cycle and, analysing the artworks relevantly, he comprehended my personal intentions. Here is an extract from his publication: “Everybody has his own centre of the world. A specific one, which comprises a real area and a mental map of our existence. Usually we identify it with the place we know thoroughly, domesticated, generating the highest emotions, uncountable number of associations and memories. In our imagination it most frequently has an iconic character and thanks to it becomes a value we can refer to. As a kind of rhetorical device, the place undergoes a slight fade and symbolic transformation. It happens that we abandon one centre for another. But it doesn’t mean that the first one disintegrates, vanishes. It simply becomes an additional landmark. The further we go in time and space, the more such places we put aside to our personal archive. We build up a peculiar symbolic and vivid system of reference. What is interesting, defining a new world centre puts us aside because we can recognize and define it only from outside.”
The cycle Another way conveys another important context for me – spirituality. I tried to redefine it in the terms of generally accepted norms. As a result, I discovered spirituality from scratch, spirituality that is semantically closer to philosophical reflection than to religious dogma. While I was working on the visual part of Another way, a sort of inner need made me deal with the concept of rationalisation. I verified my attitude towards existing religious systems and ideologies connected with them at that time. This self-reflection resulted in realizations related to church: cathedral (Another way IV), the cross (Another way III) and in a partly puckish and allegoric metaphor comprised in the title the another graphic: The touch. I consider the process of forging a spiritual identity that assists working on images as permanent; nevertheless, I accept its variability and conformity which resulted in other realizations.
Smoothly getting about within the frames of the concept led to creation of the next image symbolically entitled Road. This space itself and the connotations it provokes are connected with the industrialised part of the Katowice cityscape. The intention that assisted the process of creating this artwork was the attempt to show motifs of Sacred architecture in the world I was creating. The introspection, which was since the beginning present in my artistic efforts, changed slightly in terms of expression means. As a careful observer and a man rooted in reality, I turned to concentrating on the insight of matters in a natural and seamless way. The symbolism contained in the graphic Road was a turning point in the way I used to perceive the space I created. Originally, I turned a real territory into an inner space. Since that moment, I consider that stage of my efforts to find myself in the city space through creating its graphic parallel, which started many years earlier, as closed. The cycles On the roof of a building (2002-2006) and Above the pavement (2007-2009) and finally Another way were my endeavours to identify with the city mechanisms. A very strong and often modified need for security assisted my search of identity. Having at least partly satisfied it, I inclined to change the direction and the object of exploration: I concentrated on an accurate study of the inner world. Observing mental processes and states, I decided to create a unique environment, a space which could be exploited only by actual presence within it. The concept of this space applies to an unlimited expanse, infinite and diverse but absolutely secure at the same time. This idealistic world enables one to get around by any means and at any pace without any physical or time constraints.
The next four graphics are based on the above theory – a diptych An empty egg and two artworks initiating a new cycle In the search of a forgotten dream. An empty egg is a diptych realisation presenting not clearly defined architectural forms supplemented by elements blinking with black light. It is an attempt to ‘overwork’ a not-too-distant in the past incident and to foster and support positive changes in life perception and the development of personality in the created space-- in psychology it is called post-traumatic growth. I located an intimate story within the secure space I generated. An empty egg I and An empty egg II existing as a diptych was originally meant to be a triptych. Already during my work on the third part I abandoned the idea. Realisation of two out of three projects functioned as some sort of auto therapy and the result being sufficient enough, I deliberately and definitely stopped working on the next realisation.
Two other graphics entitled In the search of a forgotten dream I and II initiated a thought-provoking to me theme that concerned the analyses of night dreams. I concentrated on a graphic interpretation of a dream that used to recur to me in the past. I tried to evoke not only the memorised images but also the emotional states they provoked. I relocated the reminiscences of the sleep into the parallel reality, building a mental map step by step. The first instalment of In the search of a forgotten dream had a centric point assigned to it. That point was the source of the topography of geometric forms systematically changing and evolving into still more complicated objects formed around it. One of the objects, the central one, is a visual synonym for a symbolic concept of ego or soul and an equivalent of immaterial place, constituting habitat, that was earlier defined in the graphics 10m2, 25m2 and 65m2.
A spherical object centrally located in an undefined space is the subject of the second instalment of the cycle. Its form directly corresponds with a memorised part of the night dream where a spherical object was constantly changing. Being close to it resulted in the feeling of gravitational change and an impression of existence in a totally different space-time. In the architectural constructions of In the search of the forgotten dream II, I tried to demonstrate the ephemeral and hard-to-present dreamlike motives together with jottings of memories that accompanied the dream.
Described above, the cycle of graphics entitled A room with a view comprises an artistic achievement I consider to be a completed set. During the last five years the sequence of graphics evolved in a natural way in terms of concept, but as far as the visual layer is concerned, it remained unchanged within the frames set up at the beginning. My way of perceiving the changing city and the visualisation of my reflections in graphic form were a natural succession to the observations I made. Flexible modifications in the artistic approach I regard as a valuable experience. I managed to transform effectively the extraverted perception and activities aimed at my surroundings into a straightforward artistic exploration of intensified, introverted character.
A strong, inner necessity to express myself and to visualise the psychological processes I experienced as well as the need to communicate with the surroundings that constantly accompanied me at my work underlined the inception of the cycle. A room with a view I treat as a summa, a completed artistic work presenting and summarising successive phases of forming one’s identity with a place in a social context and then as an insight into my personal identity. In my opinion, intentional and progressively deepening introspection definitely raised the level of identification with the work, giving a transcendental dimension to respective realisations.
