ACCOMPANYING PROGRAMME

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Małgorzata Gołębiewska and Marcin Gołębiewski
Zdzisław Beksiński’s Sculptures

The exhibition of Zdzisław Beksiński’s sculptures in the gardens of the Wawel Royal Castle is a pioneering event for many reasons. This is due to the non-obvious presence of the contemporary artist in the field of substantive and program interest of this institution, the fact that it is the first exhibition of Beksiński’s works focused exclusively on three-dimensional works, as well as the publication of a catalog devoted to the sculptures of the artist, who is mainly known for his painting, drawing, and photography . What are we dealing with and what is the phenomenon of the works presented in the gardens?

The attention of the audience visiting the Zdzisław Beksiński gallery in the Historical Museum in Sanok focuses on the sensitively arranged exhibition of paintings. However, it was the plaster sculptures from the 1960s, placed on simple wooden bases designed by the artist, that made the greatest impression on us; an exhibition consisting of only a dozen or so items: nine heads, three reliefs and a monumental sculpture entitled Hamlet. For us, it was the beginning of thinking about popularizing Beksiński’s sculptural work, about the exhibition of sculpture casts in bronze.

“After 1960, new sets of works were created. Beksiński mainly created full sculptures – large figures made of sheet metal and a series of several “heads” (head-like structures) made of patinated plaster”[1].

At the exhibition “Beksiński. Sculptures” we will see sculptures in the Wawel gardens in the series Heads – casts in bronze, variations on the subject of a human skull. It is a very diverse collection, from openwork, light, intersected, hollow forms, to fuller blocks with numerous depressions and holes resembling multiplied eye sockets. Beksiński definitely did not identify sculpture with a closed form and a uniform solid, he experimented with its materiality.

Apart from heads and flat reliefs, the exhibition also includes casts of two monumental sculptures: Hamlet and Macbeth. Hamlet is also known for a black-and-white family photograph in which Tomek poses sitting on a sculpture, next to his parents standing on either side. “One of his metal sculptures features a seated figure. (He gives it the title Hamlet, as he puts his son on it and photographs him)”[2]. Its form refers to the seated Mother and Child by Moore from 1931 or his composition Family from 1950. Hamlet is a figure, or rather a highly processed image of a human figure, stretched out, strongly bent, unstable and requiring a pedestal, forming the form of a throne or an armchair. The wide torso is a natural support, the pointed, upturned knees form the shape of the seat. The scale, slenderness of the figure, distortion of the figure and the blackness of the patina intensify the impression of unreality. The surface of the sculpture is no longer as smooth as in the case of the heads, there are grooves and a textured effect. Hamlet is an example of an abstract work that is also figurative, though far from realism.

The second figural sculpture presented at the exhibition, which was made in metal as early as in the 1960s, is Macbeth. The project shows a high level of experiencing emotions by the artist, suggestive, intensively affecting the viewer. A tragic figure, depicted as a kneeling figure, with his arms stretched upwards – Beksiński achieves a strong, dramatic effect. There is, as in Hamlet, a certain contrast between smooth and rougher parts. The sculpture is in the collection of BWA in Rzeszów, it was purchased for the collection for PLN 6,800[3].

THE END AND THE BEGINNING (?)

Zdzisław Beksiński’s sculptures were also publicly presented in the period when they were created. In 1964, in the Old Orangery in Warsaw’s Łazienki, in the Gallery of the Artist and the Viewer, an individual exhibition of Zdzisław Beksiński took place, which was an undoubted success for the artist and resulted in many reviews.

The artifacts that have survived to our times, small, intimate plaster sculptures with the motif of a human head and expressive figures contrasting with them, often disturbingly interrupted, translucent, welded from iron plates, gain in importance, constituting an undeniable value from the point of view of art history.

It is puzzling to abandon sculpture, as well as abstraction or photography. If Beksiński had had favorable conditions in the 1960s, a suitable space to work, a sculpture studio and financial resources necessary to create casts in precious materials, would he have decided to continue working in this medium?

Or has the artist simply realized that he will not achieve anything more in terms of sculpture, and this is still not the specific means of expression he wants and needs?

These are open questions that we ask on the occasion of this exhibition.

Cracow, December 2022

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[1] Zdzisław Beksiński, Letters to Jerzy Lewczyński, edition and introduction: Olga Ptak, Museum in Gliwice, Gliwice 2015, p. 223, footnote 3.[2] Magdalena Grzebałkowska, The Beksińskis. Double portrait, Znak, Kraków 2014, p. 76.[3] Ibid.