Page 74 - Studio International - April 1968

London commentary

Six Polish Painters

In this country we have had plenty of evidence of makes is of rather beautiful, though slightly dis­ have an opportunity to complete the picture of
Polish artistic activity in the cinema, drama and turbing, fungoid washes of paint. Closer inspection contemporary Polish painting by an exhibition of
poetry. What little we have seen of Polish painting reveals the outline of a crucified figure, most the under-forties. D
and sculpture would encourage the view that these clearly in Man II, but also, strangely, in Tantalus. Cyril Barrett
arts lag behind the other two. Perhaps this is the Tadeusz Brzozowski-a painter of stature-conveys
case, but, having seen the exhibition of Six Polish the same feeling both in the troubled faces of his
Painters at the Royal College of Art (organized figures and in the suggestion of a barbed-wire mess
by the Arts Council in collaboration with the in his abstracts. The one painter who seems to be
Polish Ministry of Culture and the Fine Arts and breaking out of this Polish preoccupation is
the Polish Cultural Institute) one suspects that Aleksander Kobzdej, though even in his 'fissure'
the gap may not be too great. The exhibition paintings, which are more cosmopolitan than those
included a selection of posters in which the Poles of his colleagues, there is still a certain spikiness.
excel. It was so placed, however, that many visitors It is to be hoped that at an early date we shall
to the gallery must have missed it.
The decision to limit the contributors to six-thus
making it six one-man shows rather than a repre­
sentative show-was a wise one. But the choice of
artists raises a doubt. All six artists are over forty,
two in fact, are no longer alive-Piotr Potworowski
died in 1962, Tadeusz Makowski in 1932. Does this
mean that the younger Polish artists are not up to
the standard of the six or is this a first instalment,
to be followed by another exhibition of the under­
forties?
Whether there is any significance in the fact that
all six painters are in some way or another connec­
ted with Cracow, I cannot say, but the fact that
both Makowski and Potworowski spent a great
part of their active life in Paris is clearly evident in
their work. Makowski is a primitive who fell among
Cubists and managed to absorb Cubism into his art.
The charm and expressiveness of his world of folk
art and fairytale, with its starry-eyed musiciam,
artisans and children, should not blind us to the
strength and mastery of his compositions. Pot­
worowski-who incidentally spent much time in
this country, taught at Corsham and was a friend
of the 'Cornish' group, Ben Nicholson, Peter
Lanyon, Bryan Wynter and Patrick Heron­
practised a softer, gentler form of Cubism. In some
ways his patchwork use of colour is reminiscent of
Klee, as if he were transcribing a Braque or a
icholson into a design suitable for a quilt.
In his catalogue introduction, Dr Stanislawski,
Director of the Lodz Museum of Art and the man
responsible for selecting the pictures, says that the
same lyrical and expansive emotion is traceable in
the work of the other four painters. While I hesitate
to dissent from such an authority, especially on the
basis of only a brief visit to Poland during the
closed season, there seems to me to be a consider­
able difference in feeling between the two groups
and, moreover, the four seem to be far more typical
of what is specifically Polish in contemporary art.
What this is I find hard to define. For one thing it
is a sense of suffering and tragedy-which painters Above left Tadeusz Makowski
of this generation must have experienced at first Miser 1932
hand-sometimes (though not quite in this exhibi­ oil on canvas. 46¼ x 35 in.
tion) reaching almost to morbidity. Another
ingredient is a slightly (sometimes a pronounced) Above Aleksander Kobzdej
uneasy marriage between surrealist imagery and Fissure in Green 1967
Abstract Expressionism. acrylic and miscellaneous matter. 72 x 39½ in.
This is to be found in its most obvious form in the
work ofEugeniusz Markowski, but it is also, though Left Jerzy Tchbrzewski
to a lesser extent, in that of Jerzy Tch6rzewski. Man 111967
The first impression which Tch6rzewski's work oil on canvas. 63 x 51 ¾ in.
198