sculpture
steel structure, acrylic on paper

An empty pedestal is an object with powerful metaphorical associations. It can signify the passage of time, the fall of a regime or ideology, a crisis of authority or oblivion. On an empty pedestal found among the housing blocks, the artist places the figure of Atlas, creating a temporary monument charged with symbolic references.

Standing on the pedestal, Atlas bears a multitude of things on his back, their weight pressing down on him. Over the course of our lives, we accumulate ever more memories, concerns and obligations that are difficult to carry. Despite their mounting weight, we do not relinquish them, but take them with us as we continue on our way.

The artist on his work:

The figure of Atlas carries on his shoulders an arrangement of geometric solids resembling fragments of the housing estate, their blocks covered with drawings. That is how I began as an artist – drawing on the walls of buildings in Warsaw’s Ursynów district. In the sculpture I made for the festival, I recreated drawings from my childhood containing many motifs that are still present in my work today. They include playgrounds, palisades and totems among which children used to play. There is the funeral of the painter Malevich, one of the fathers of modernity in art, including architecture. I also drew housing blocks destroyed by war that I saw during my trips to Ukraine.

The world is made up of images that we carry with us like the mythical Atlas. If the Polish word for housing estate, osiedle, contains the idea of settling down (osiadanie), of remaining in one place, then the accumulation of images is like a vortex pulling us in. Perhaps being condemned to carry this ever-growing collection with us really is a punishment of sorts. Are we guilty here of believing  in the promises of modernity?

MIKOŁAJ CHYLAK

is an artist working across various areas of the visual arts, with a particular focus on painting. He also creates three-dimensional works inspired by found objects, as well as short films and literary pieces. He graduated from the Faculty of Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in 2000 and completed his PhD there in 2019 with the dissertation Atlas as Collection and Journey, which developed his own interpretation of Aby Warburg’s ideas and the Mnemosyne Atlas. He currently heads the Painting and Drawing Studio at the Faculty of Design of the same academy. He is a co-founder of Pracownia Wschodnia gallery in Warsaw, where he also occasionally curates group shows and exhibitions centred on specific subjects. His work examines the European idea of civilisation, its inconsistencies, poetic qualities and the violence embedded within it.