Jarosław Fliciński – Koniec Lata

To what extend does painting prove to be art which is still capable of carrying messages and corresponding to the rhythm of contemporary sensitivity when it has constantly been overtaken by the latest technologies? Jarosław Fliciński enters into no dispute with the tradition of his own domain because he is more engaged in the possibilities of reviving painting and finding a reliable form of communication for it, despite limitations intrinsic to a painterly convention. Indeed, formal limits imposed by the medium itself have never been a real hindrance for him – whether he will exceed the frame of the canvas towards space and paint directly on walls or specially constructed elements which compose the architecture of the exhibition or whether he will use light, sound, photography or video.

This painter of large-scale canvases with repeated motifs of lines, circles, stripes or stencilled patterns usually applies simple geometrical forms. However, any association with Minimal Art will not pertain to form as much as to his interest in a site as the space of reception, the arrangement of the entire exhibition area and in the dialogue between architecture, light and paintings themselves.

Jarosław Fliciński's latest project "The End of Summer" has been prepared especially for the space of Le Guern Gallery. A series of paintings on sheet metal and a panting installation introduce a new perspective for the perception of the gallery interior. His thinking in the categories of a given site, its spatial and architectural conditions, disrupts the neutrality of exhibition space and encourages our perception to go beyond a Minimalist lesson of sensitivity. This is similar to the artist's earlier realisations, e.g. in Badischer Kunstverein (Karlsruhe 2000), Chinati Foundation (Marfa 2002), or the Centre for Contemporary Art Zamek Ujazdowski (Warszawa 2003).

Mark Gisbourne, writing for the exhibition catalogue, finds possibilities for the interpretation of Jarosław Fliciński's art on the grounds of psycho-physiology of perception and phenomenological thought. The bottom line of the critic's thinking is the visual negotiation between what has been intended by the artist and what is shared by the viewer's perception.

Curator: Bożena Czubak