wietrzna pauza 2021

Curator: Lech Jankowski's "wietrzna pauza" from 2021, which translates to "windy pause," offers a captivating exploration of texture and form. It's a mixed-media piece, combining oil paint and other elements, creating a wonderfully tactile surface. Editor: Oh, my first thought is that it's brooding! The somber palette evokes a very interior feeling, as if looking into a closed space, both weighty and almost crumbling somehow. Curator: I see that! And the impasto technique really emphasizes that sense of weight, doesn’t it? It's as though the artist is building up layers of experience, like sedimentary rock documenting time and pressure. The material itself becomes a record. Editor: Absolutely! And what’s interesting is the choice of medium. Why mix oil and potentially other materials? What conversations are happening at the level of the material process that could potentially speak to the subject? Curator: That's the intriguing question, isn't it? The abstract geometric shapes seem to fight against the freedom usually found in abstraction—a pause almost caged in or deliberately shaped, the textures maybe emphasizing weathering or enforced stasis. A kind of still life but not quite. Editor: Right! A still life where the "still" is… almost violent. Considering the title—"windy pause"—it feels like a very internalized experience, maybe a turbulent rest or contemplative chaos…almost as though the material is also internalizing. And the layering of materials themselves? Was the underpainting an end or a means to some other process? Curator: A pertinent point: perhaps the layering becomes metaphorical itself. Jankowski isn’t merely depicting something still, but presenting us with the act of contemplation itself, layering over thoughts as time wears on. The crackling effect, like old paint, evokes a history held within the silence. Editor: Precisely! I’m leaving this feeling as though I’m a little outside of a conversation, peering in at this “windy pause” but also implicated by the material choices to keep bearing witness. Curator: Yes, and the beauty of it all is, as we all know, that each windy pause, each moment of silence holds its own unique history and form. Thank you, Lech, for offering up this one.