Jerzy Boniński. PHOTOGRAPHY
Creating useless things while being fully aware that they may be incomprehensible and may get lost, seeking something
whose meaning is so fleeting, is a grand gesture of will,
a true fulfilment of our thought.
Continual, perpetual creation, born of experience and dreams which might at any time contradict everything that has
been arisen earlier.
Gestures that are not discrete but are successive forms of the work of one life.
With no fulfilment and ultimate discovery, but only in becoming and in continuous completing and contradicting
yourself on this unique road to death.
Jerzy Boniński

Writing a text for a catalogue which is to accompany an exhibition is an exceptional task, especially when the author of the
text is himself involved in artistic creation. The difficulty consists, mainly, in that the exhibition and the catalogue are addressed
to the art lover, since the others are artists or art critics, or art dealers themselves – and they always “know better”.
Art, as a sphere of life, is a phenomenon, since it presents things seen by the soul and what counts here is the method of
intuition, the spiritual outlook, in order to create things in a subjective manner. To create a finished work, the artist must
realize his intentions in line with two main premises: “what” and “how” in order to give shape to his visions and ideas. Jerzy
Boniński is fully aware of this.
An exhibition is always most important to the author himself, who shows his works to the public not only to challenge
himself with how they are perceived, but rather to be able to see them in another role and in another place than the one
where the works came into being, and in all their magnificence. Thus, aware of the responsibility placed on me, I am trying
to avoid being a know-it-all since I am positive that the works on view will present themselves superbly.
The knack of the skilled use of the means of expression is highly instrumental for a suggestive presentation of perceived stati
quo, one of the artist’s fortes. Let me only say that I know all the existing creative works of Jerzy Boniński – both paintings
and photographs, and I think highly of him both as a person and as an artist.
In the past Jerzy Boniński used to show great series of photographed still lifes, objects set in an exceptionally pertinent
manner. Those photographs cannot be dismissed with the statement that the artist knows how to expose, thus how to set
together, various objects in order to take a photograph of them. These were always works of art that carried a full range of
meanings and that were very convincing as far as their creative aspect is concerned.
Now Jerzy Boniński introduces people to his works. These are figures who are particularly close to him. Therefore in many
instances he curtails the space or the person shown by using a mirror. But the mirror is a false curtailment, for it in fact
enhances the importance of things, since a mirror creates a twin for each object, a separate status quo. It intensifies the effect,
and so the viewer cannot remain indifferent, tepid or detached, and the emotions the artist put into his works must,
naturally, stir the imagination of all who look upon them.Jerzy Boniński – born in Warsaw in 1955; graduated in painting at the
Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw (ASP), under Professor Tadeusz Dominik.
Since 1983, Boniński has been working at the ASP. He was a member of the
Nowa Ekspresja (New Expression) movement. “Ekspresja lat 80-tych”
(Expression of the 1980s), Sopot 1986; “¦wieżo malowane” (Wet Paint),
Zachęta 1988. In his works he often refers to the avant-garde of the
beginning of the century.

Exhibition: 2008.11.29 – 2009.01.04