By subjecting his photographic topics, wether they are taken from the
media or not, to "multiple superimpositions", Krzysztof Pruszkowski
demonstrates the limits of the new reality. A reality which disolves the
notion of time picture by picture and, in a way, accounts for the speed
which characterizes some videoclips, the instant circulation of information
and pictures around the world. We are no more in the order of the snapshot.
His process: to subject the picture to up to sixty or seventy superimpositions.
He names it "photosynthesis" - the gathering of information
which could not be covered in one shot. The process is often limited to
six or seven superimpositions. The picture doubles, triples, reaches the
edge of fuzziness, and provokes a conflict between global and individual,
between singular and plural.
Therefore, when Krzysztof Pruszkowski addresses one of todays most difficult
artistic concepts, which is the portrait, he does not provide a cohesive
picture of the model, but rather the search and formulation of an individuality
composed by superimposing different faces. For example Jean-Paul Sartre
and Simone de Beauvoir (1984), or sometimes more generic, as if he was
slowly building up a photofit (portrait-robot), like "Miss
Europe" or as with "The President"(1984), with the merged
portraits of six American presidents.
This is in fact the new representation of the individual within the present
social code, commonly named the typical profile for job selection (profil-type
des offres d'emploi). The notion of individual has gone from specific
to generic, from unique to interchangeable, like the objects which have
changed from original to reproduction. A plural vision of a world where
"production" is a key word, and where the stock exchange is
the new identity, the institution on which everything relies. "The
Paris Stock Exchange" (1986), this place of urgency par excellence
where everything is evaluated, is also probably a metaphor for the circulation
of money around todays artwork.
The artist does not interpret the world by establishing its apparent
form but rather restors its complexity and places it in a context which
reveals the richness of its metamorphosis.
A brilliant concept.
Jerome Sans
(Director Tokyo Palace, Paris)
Krzysztof Pruszkowski
Krzysztof Pruszkowski was born in Kazimierz nad Wisla (Poland) in 1943.
After architecture and town planning studies at the Warsaw Polytechnic
University he moves to Paris where he stays until 1988. He continues his
studies in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux Arts (Art Academy) and at the
Institut de l"Urbanisme (Town Planning Institute).
Since 1970 his interest in photography develops, first fashion
and publicity, then press photography. In the same time he is looking
for his own "visual language" and he publishes a photo book
"Barriers" which deals with human mass manipulation within urban
space and holds an exhibition at the Paris Centre Pompidou (1978).
From 1975 Pruszkowski works on developing a new method of photography
called "photosynthese".
In 1981 he makes series of reports about the young, independent
peasant union "Solidarnosc" which were published in the French
daily Liberation. The images were made into posters, drawing attention
to occupied Poland under marshal law.
Between 1981-1986 he creates his big project about the disappearance
of Parisian tramp (clochard) Alexander wich was shown in Poland and France.
In 1986 he produces synthesis portraits of 60 first and second
class passengers of the Parisian metro in which he brings to attention
the class related character of racism.
1988 - the Musee de l'Elysee in Lausanne presents the retrospective
exhibition "Monopose - No. Photosynthese - Si" accompanied by
the book "Pruszkowski - Photosynthese".
Soon after that he receives the Leonardo de Vinci grant to stay and study
in Egypt, granted by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In 1989 he returns to his home town Kazimierz nad Wisla where he publishes
his portofolio - A Manifest on Architectural Form: K.M.K. (Konstrukcja
Materializacji Konceptu).
In 1993 the National Museums of Warsaw and of Wroclaw (Poland)
devote themselves to a large Pruszkowski exhibition, where his photsyntheses
are exhibited in confrontation with the corresponding objects borrowed
from various Egyptian museums. These exhibitions are accompanied by the
book "Photology Egypt, Pruszkowski's Light and Photosynthesis"
(Fotologia Egipt - Swiatlo i Fotosynteza, Pruszkowski).
1994 - Pruszkowski is invited to take part in the exhibition "Europa
- Europa - 100 years of Central and Eastern European Avant-Garde""
In 2000 Pruszkowski receives a grant from the Polish Ministry
of Culture. He is currently working on monumental objects relating to
historical events.
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