Urszula Ślusarczyk
On the threshold of visibility
curator: Anna Kłos
25.04.2022 – 20.05.2022
A few words about the painting exhibition by Urszula Ślusarczyk, “On the threshold of visibility”.
When one stands in front of the paintings by Ula Ślusarczyk, one is standing on the threshold of the painting space where one can enter, experience emotions, read intentions, climb as though up a Wittgenstein ladder, which the author has logically and perfectly prepared for us. And then, abandoning it, we can surrender to the space of the unknown, no longer logical, but metaphysical, seen from the existential perspective. We can also stand in front of Ula’s painting and see only a flat canvas covered with paint, divided into geometric planes of subtle colours with no clear message.
In the first case, the viewer must halt, because this art is contemplative. The paintings are built of simple forms: planes and lines, whose proportions create a weighted harmony and order, which Art likes. Then, colour takes over the action, where the main actor is blue and its variety in valor intensity. Paint ceases to exist and begins to be only a subtle colour, and by means of well-aimed and long-mixed drops of darker or lighter, the painter obtains light. Light is needed to radiate energy, but light alone, even from the best colour, is not enough to achieve the effect of consonance. There is a need for a very precise combination of colours, resulting from intuition and exploration. The set is consciously limited, which makes it more difficult to obtain the sound. The artist cannot hide behind a colouring book that carries away chaos of meaning in favour of decorativeness. Ślusarczyk has applied a difficult and one of the most interesting painting tricks, namely she has juxtaposed colours that have no value contrast but differ in colour contrast. This trick slowly draws the viewer into the depths and allows them to feel like a discoverer, of the most sensitive ones. Light becomes in this case a condition for obtaining meaning and the essence of the message. The optimal meeting of all elements on the canvas: balanced composition, transparency, symbolic colour, sophisticated contrasts, harmonious order, sometimes texture, results in a satisfying painting notation, containing a message, preferably a universal one.
In the second case, a viewer who does not contemplate, who does not want or is not able to break through the conventional flat canvas record, does not experience emotions, truth and authenticity carried by the form of the work of art, often laboriously constructed by the artist in an interesting and often mysterious creative process, equally important as the final work. I have an impression that the form in Ula Ślusarczyk’s painting is one of those forms which in the final creative process transform themselves, innocently taking advantage of the artist’s talent. This symbiosis of the invisible and the visible reinforces the author’s imperative, which is the condition of any art. The aphorism of Wittgenstein’s ladder I mentioned above can elevate the recipient of art beyond materiality into the realm of values, spirituality, can transcend, in this case, the semblance of art and, consequently, lead to the transformation of the viewer who identifies realities.
Dr hab. Dariusz Mlącki
Retroavangarda Gallery at Jerozolimskie Business Park
Aleje Jerozolimskie 146D, 02-305 Warsaw
Gallery opening times: Tuesday – Friday 11 AM – 5 PM
Organizers: Retroavangarda, WIT– Szkoła Wyższa pod auspicjami PAN, Apollo Rida
www: retroavangarda.com
e-mail: retroavangarda.com@gmail.com