WITEK ORSKI. Holes in the Ground
Holes in the Ground (2014-2016) are simple in form, monumental photographs of holes dug by the artist in the ground. Starting from the reflection on the relationships between photographic image and abstraction, Orski deliberately broadens the scope of the interpretation of these works, provoking reflection on the economy of the artwork production and the relationships between imaging and death.
The exhibition at the Arsenal Gallery in Białystok is the first presentation of this cycle as a whole (selected works were previously featured at, among other places: Kunsthalle Bratislava, Zachęta – National Gallery of Art in Warsaw and Wroclaw BWA).
Łukasz Zaremba
Holes in the Ground
1.
If only it were possible to say, with reasonable accuracy, that the photographs show graves. Armed with pertinent quotations (from Barthes, Blanchot or Belting) and with volumes, whole libraries almost, of theoretical reflections (from theology to psychoanalysis), we could spin one of those tales about the relations of death and images, two phenomena so often, and so convincingly, presented as twinned. Focusing on the medium of photography: a death mask, a grave – or on the image as such: a crypt, a tombstone, an empty grave, a mark of death, an absence – we could hunt for the meanings of the works from the Holes in the Ground series. Which, by the way, are physically large enough to suggest to the viewer that a premature try-out of a suitable hole in the ground may actually be an option. In the worst case, therefore, we would see the series as a suggestive memento mori.
Paul Celan
THERE WAS EARTH INSIDE THEM, and
they dug.
They dug and dug, and so
their day went past, their night. And they did not praise God,
who, so they heard, wanted all this,
who, so they heard, witnessed all this.
They dug and heard nothing more;
they did not grow wise, invented no song,
devised for themselves no sort of language.
They dug.
There came a stillness then, came also storm,
all of the oceans came.
I dig, you dig, and it, the worm, digs too,
and the singing there says: They dig.
O one, O none, O no one, O you:
Where did it go, then, making for nowhere?
O you dig and I dig, and I dig through to you,
and the ring on our finger awakens.
(translated by: John Felstiner )
Witek Orski (born 1985) –visual artist and art theoretician. His works were featured in solo exhibitions “The Vulgar” and “Ćwiecenie” at the Czułość Gallery in Warsaw and group exhibitions in Tokyo, Paris, Berlin, Budapest, Bratislava and Poland (including: Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle, Museum of Modern Art and Zachęta – National Gallery of Art in Warsaw). He is a PhD student in the Institute of Philosophy at the University of Warsaw and in the Faculty of Multimedia Communication at the University of Fine Arts in Poznań (Poland). Lives and works in Warsaw.
Related event:
21 January 2017, 11.00
Artist and curator-led tour of the exhibition with Polish Sign Language Interpreter
Interpreter: Justyna Nowosadko
Free entry
Curator: Sylwia Narewska
PLAN YOUR VISIT
Opening times:
Thuesday – Sunday
10:00-18:00
Last admission
to exhibition is at:
17.30