https://www.facebook.com/events/1546993955606416/
THE KRASNALS
Jews
Jews
May 13 – June 4, 2016
Opening: May 13, at 6pm
Galeria Fibak, ul. Krakowskie Przedmieście 5, Warsaw
JEWS / The
Krasnals
‘Jews’
- The Krasnals' project is a collection of over 50 paintings of the
same size depicting well-known Jews. All scenes presented on the pictures come
from American and European movies from the last eighty years. This project,
being a natural consequence of the famous series ‘Nazis’
by Uklański, presents faces of famous characters,
who became commonly recognizable thanks to the silver screen. We do not
consider whether it is good or bad - it creates a specific quality, very
problematic in terms of combining historical truth and authenticity with its
load of knowledge, emotions, and different kinds of values that we cannot
specify exactly here.
Being used to movie
images causes a sort of pervert confusion, a feeling of attachment which
acknowledges the shift of authenticity and realistic truth into the background,
in exchange for a fascinating story developing in front of us. Who is the
authentic Mark Zuckerberg? He himself or the actor Jesse Eisenberg? Amedeo
Modigliani or Andy Garcia? Who is The Wolf of Wall Street - Jordan Belfort or
Leonardo di Caprio?
We have applied
here the rule of exaggeration, we wanted to have lots of paintings. Lots of
portraits and characters. In order to extract a new quality out of them. We
called in our friends painters to help us. Over a few months they were coming
to the studio and painting their artistic visions.
We are not of
Jewish origin, we even do not know many Jews. But this subject is present all
the time in social communication, in media conspiracies, so there is no way to
avoid being interested in it. All the time, there are phobias, panics,
discussions - including aggressive conspiracy theories, as well as
controversial (in the field of art) subject of Holocaust and its so-called
commercialization. In the midst of it all, there is something attractive and
fascinating, something we feel drawn into. We could provisionally call it the
blood tissue soaking with wild artistry. Something alive, injected with
hormones. Actually, both us and our friends artists know Jews only from we have
read about them, heard about them, and from the movies. Visually, just from the
movies. Occasionally, from the news on TV or the Internet.
We started with
repainting selected frames. Realistically, faithfully. In colour, sometimes in
black and white. All in squares 50x50 cm big. Great frames, a goldmine of
inspiration, ready images. Things got really interesting when someone came
across a problem. People started tinkering with paints. Almost getting under
the skin. Unexpected things started to happen. A hitherto unseen in the
original frames expression came into light, sometimes as a result of an
abstract procedure. One day, for example, we started to cut out our fragments
from the frames, in order to look at them from a different perspective,
approaching them closely even to the point of intimacy. Where the detailed
picture starts to blur, there are the strongest accents.
Jews are said to be
just like everyone else, only more so. We, as artists, at this moment are not
interested in the big picture of this phenomenon, this nation, we are not too
keen to possess the entire huge volume of knowledge about their history,
culture, politics. What we would like to express right now, as artists, is our
delight in the word ‘more’.
The Krasnals
Posts
