WITOLD-K (b. 1932), Untitled, from the series Green Holes, 2021

acrylic, canvas; 86.5 x 68 cm;
Signed and dated p. d.: WITOLD-K 21.

EXHIBITED:
Witold-K, "So Many Worlds" Gallery, Oświęcim Cultural Center, 3.09. - 9.10.2022.

Witold-K's paintings are about loneliness, alienation and the search for hidden emotions. According to the painter, a painting should be more than an answer to the questions that bother the artist. If it is not, the work is only an illustration. Around 1950, a vision of a black hole appeared in the mind of Vygotsky-K, which the artist necessarily wanted to visualize. He proceeded to create sketches and canvases, where a dark, engulfing space with jagged edges became the central element of the composition. The natural next step in the development of this idea seems to be the Green Hole series of paintings. Like the Black Hole compositions, the first works feature a central dark and murky space with jagged edges, from within which emerges an understated, luminous emerald form. In the 1950s, when Vygotsky began work on the black hole project, the concept did not yet exist among the physical sciences. It wasn't until 1969 that John Archibald Wheeler proposed a name to describe the phenomenon. Witold K, actually Wit Leszek Kaczanowski, is one of the few Polish painters with an established artistic position, both in Europe and the United States. His achievements in the field of visual arts have been recognized by Sotheby's Auction House, where one of the artist's largest exhibitions (Amsterdam branch) was held in 2007 and a monumental album summarizing his work was published́. Witold-K can alsȯ boast́ a portrait done by Pablo Picasso, dating back to 1967, which was exhibited at the National Museum in Krakow in 2013. In the same year Kaczanowski was awarded the Silver Medal for Merit to Culture Gloria Artis.