Adam Rzepecki
I Apologize The Society For My Temporary Absence In Art 22.03–20.04.2013
Adam Rzepecki is one of the most interesting artists of his generation, debuting at the turn of the 70s and 80s, he was the only member of the group “Łódź Kaliska” living in Cracow. The exhibition at the Dawid Radziszewski Gallery will consist of his individual works, photographs, documentations of actions, and manifestos.
Rzepecki is best known as the author of “Madonna with a mustache” made in the early 80s. However, after a detailed inventory of the artist’s archive, it turns out that his work is diverse and ranges from conceptualism to neo-dadaism, full of exciting moments and unexpected turns. Rzepecki was a performer, an experimental photographer and filmmaker, a political artist and ironic observer of the art world. All his activities are influenced by Eastern European melancholy and a nihilism specific to the declining years of PRL (People’s Republic of Poland). In one of the photos Rzepecki is sticking his nose (using a distraction of the museum’s guards) to Marcel Duchamp’s work – The Large Glass. Other photos document his performance in Miastko, during which he carried a brick for 8 hours (with meal breaks) to capture the struggle for the eight-hour day.
In 1990, Christopher Jurecki in the journal “Student” wrote: “I do not want that situation where Adam’s projects, after years, are drawn from the couch of a Cracow apartment or found behind a wardrobe. It would be a greater evil and misfortune to Polish culture than deleting him from the annals of art, on which many people are successfully working.” Perhaps this greater evil was accomplished as the works were actually found in the couch in Cracow apartment (at least a part of them).
The first exhibition of archival works by Adam Rzepecki, after a long absence, was held in June 2012 at the Pies Gallery in Poznan, it was titled “The work of the years 1978 to 1984 and one of 1990”. At the Dawid Radziszewski gallery we will see a greatly expanded version of that show.
