acrylic / cardboard
54 × 99 cm (light framed)
signed: l.g.: "1987 | JAN | BER | DYSZ | AK".
Jan Berdyszak (1934-2014) - painter, graphic artist, sculptor, author of installations, stage designer, art theoretician, educator. Graduate of the State Higher School of Fine Arts in Poznań and professor at his alma mater (today the Academy of Fine Arts). Winner of the Jan Cybis Award (1978), awarded the Knight's Cross (1988) and the Officer's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta (2001), as well as a Doctorate Honoris Causa from the Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava (1999).
Berdyszak has become known as an exceptionally versatile artist, successfully using a wide range of techniques and media in his work. However, he was interested not only in fine arts studies, but also in deeper reflection on their philosophical underpinnings. In particular, he seemed to be inspired by Far Eastern space theory. He delved into the teachings of the Taoist thinker Lao-Tsy, according to which every phenomenon functions in a harmonious dichotomy with its opposite, and thus the inside and outside - values in opposition to each other - balance each other out, creating a cosmic unity . Printmaking seems to occupy a special place in Jan Berdyszak's artistic oeuvre. The artist created his first works in this technique as early as the 1950s, during his studies. Each time, however, he tried to transcend the traditional understanding of printmaking by experimenting with variable materials, especially different types of substrate. Berdyszak's interest in the medium of woodcut can be traced back to his fascination with Far Eastern art and philosophical systems. On the technological side, it also seemed to fit in with his inquiries into the interpenetration of forms, pairs of relationships: convex-concave, hollow-full.