Untitled, 2017 „(…) they stood on the seashore wishing to walk through
it and they had only a spoon to drain it (...)“* Bertolt Brecht (translation
by Julita Marmol and Iwona Rozbiewska). Installation approx. 200x150x220cm, Warsaw. Pictures from the exhibition at the Kulturverein Modern Studio Freising, Germany, 2018, and Mazovian Centre of Contemporary Art Elektrownia in Radom, Poland, 2022.
In one of his poems Bertolt Brecht wrote: “(…) they stood on the seashore wishing to walk through it and they had only a spoon to drain it (...)“.*
I came across this quote a few years ago and the absurdity of the situations described in the poem inspired me to do further artistic research. I studied and spent time on creative work in Germany. Then having lost two closest people and gone through remarkable changes in my personal life, I returned to Poland. I closed one chapter in my life and opened another one. This is a kind of spiral which has already shown up in my works.
Referring to the above-mentioned quote… Spoon - a surreal, abstract element, so to speak. This minimalistic, simplified form of a spoon, perfectly cut in metal and welded, stands in contrast to the bricks. The process of bricks creation was a very important activity for me. I visited a brickyard in the area and conducted research. I prepared a form for brick manufacture. Portions of clay mass inserted into the form, returned finely shaped clay blocks. The bricks are completely hand-made and represent a significant step in the beginnings of civilization. There are no two identical bricks. Hand-made bricks are like a shadow of human individuality. They differ even in that they occupy different spaces in the brick kiln. In my installation, they are the building materials built by me.
*an excerpt from Bertolt Brecht’s poem Exil Fot. Iwona Rozbiewska and, Marcin Kucewicz, Mazovian Centre of Contemporary Art Elektrownia in Radom.