Author

Zygmunt Szczepankowski was born in 1951 in Ciechanów. Between 1970-76 he studied Graphic Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw (under professors Antoni Łyżwiański and Stanisław Poznański). He got his diploma in 1976, from the Graphic Arts Techniques Studio of the Academy, under prof. Andrzej Rudziński. He practices painting, drawing, graphics, and applied graphics. He lives and works in Ciechanów.

Exhibitions:

1989, 1992, 1994, 1999, 2000 - Biuro Wystaw Artystycznych Galeria "C" Ciechanów
1994 - Dortmund
1999 - Galeria Bonar Łomża
2000 - Warszawa
2002 - Łódź

"I have known Zygmunt Szczepankowski for a long time. His painting is equally interesting and puzzling as he is himself. From the beginning of his artistic career, having lasted no less than 30 years, he has been dealing with figurativeness. He plays it diversely, utilizing literature, triviality of everyday life, or symbolics. He immersed into the stream of figurative art through the new figurativeness, inspired by none less than Bacon. The painting portfolio of Szczepankowski shows an artist looking for strong forms of expression, spontaneity. The dynamics of presentation, sometimes its aggressiveness, freedom in search of composition and form, show an artist liberated from esthetic and customary conventions. Szczepankowski works fast, decisively. A permanent struggle! Despite the feast of colors, this is not an art which is light and easy, but rather unquiet and extremely brutal. The painting s matter is gradually changing its face smooth and uniform, suddenly becomes boiling, exploding. The brutality of Szczepankowski s painting ideally matches the reticence, is fascinating, moving, is true and needed. His painting with its contents affects the intellect, and with its form the emotions. It builds up uneasiness and causes reflection upon a human as the most interesting creature. There is anonymity of characters, overdrawing of physical features necessary, sometimes, for distinguishing genders. Personally, I value the most in Szczepankowski the nonobviousness, which forces to watch, to analyze deeper. It does not allow leave without reflection, forget neither. Behind the curtain of coloristic attractiveness there are hidden wonderful stories, events, news. These are the themes taken from the surface of everyday life: a circus, bicycle, café, bench. Everyday life becomes extraordinary. It gets a new meaning, sometimes dramatic. It is painting about life in a new dimension, transforming it into magic, a mystery loaded with awaiting something, which may happen in a moment. The twisted bodies speak about terror. Just by the anxiety of a pictorial structure, fuzziness of the character s contours, situations, places, this art becomes highly valuable. Szczepankowski builds the space of a painting very simply: with color, temperature, light and shadow, without unnecessary perspective and sophisticated solutions. It s an art, which disputes with the spectator the existence of a human. It poses many questions. Does it answer them? Here, let everybody answer for themselves, viewing the paintings of Zygmunt Szczepankowski, which I strongly encourage."

Robert Wałęka
(Translated by Janusz Zalewski)