Janusz Bałdyga
Janusz Bałdyga (born 1954 in Lublin, lives and works in Warsaw)
He is an author of performances, drawings, objects, installations, street actions and spatial productions.
In 1979 he defended a thesis at the Painting Department of the Art Academy in Warsaw. He was supervised by professor Stefan Gierowski. He was a member and co-founder of the artistic group Pracownia Dziekanka aka Bałdyga-Onuch-Szajna. With Jerzy Onuch and Łukasz Szajna in 1976-1979 he led Pracownia Gallery in "Dziekanka" Students Art Centre. Since 1976 he has been collaborating with Akademia Ruchu theatre. For many years he has been organizing performance workshops.
Bałdyga's works from the 80's were based on the signs and symbols taken out of reality which was related to the social and political situation in Poland. "Użycie siły" ("Use of Force"), "Demonstracja siły" ("Display of strength"), "Stan posiadania" ("The Assets") manifested the uncompromising stance of the artist. Since the middle 80's the artist has been reducing his artistic expression to the simplest elements. He uses simple construction materials like wood, nails, lines, a jar, water or wine to create elementary structures like a line, circle, rectangle or point. The objects coexist with performances, sometimes result from them, release their potential during the action, and sometimes exist in an independent way. "The current state of my experience places me in the 'in between' zone", Bałdyga says, "On the one hand, it is described by performance treated as an art of confrontations and redefinitions, on the other hand by sculpture- static and absolute". In his artistic practice an object and the action are independent of each other but they live in symbiotic systems- the objects coexist with performances, sometimes result from them, release their potential during the action.
Bałdyga uses the term "marked places" which is characterized by the sense of space and its conditions and the dynamics brought by human presence. The artist's body becomes a construction element, a tool used to desribe the space, the evidence of his struggle with matter ("Wychylenia", "Uwaga granica"). His actions are characterized by balancing on the critical point and trying to activate what is concealed.
The artist does not see acting in public space as a special state. In artistic actions spatial conditions always have to be identified. In the case of open city space it is connected with the whole social plan which makes it richer. Identifying the space becomes a more complex, many-sided process. The artist in the city space confronts himself with established chaos which is not a transitional element connecting two orders, it never changes and all the time it attacks you with its superfical, rather literal, message.
"Reverse 180°"
Location: 10 Krakowskie Przedmieście Street