Paweł Olszczyński - Zak | Branicka

Paweł Olszczyński

front cover: Untitled (Sleeve), 2010, pencil on paper, 80x60 cm
Untitled, 2010, pencil on paper, 40x30 cm
Paweł Olszczyński
Fantôme Noir

Untitled (Overcoat), 2010, pencil on paper, 60x50 cm
Untitled (Man), 2010, pencil on paper, 70x48 cm

Untitled (Small Purse), 2010, pencil on paper, 30x40 cm
Untitled (Cuffs), 2010, pencil on paper, 40x30 cm
Untitled, (Shirt), 2010, pencil on paper, 50x60 cm
Untitled (Double Skirt), 2010, pencil on paper, 50x60 cm
Untitled (Black-Portrait), 2010, pencil on paper, 40x30 cm
Untitled (Hood), 2010, pencil on paper, 60x50 cm

Untitled (Wig), 2010, object, pencil on paper, 10x20x24 cm
Untitled (Bag), 2010, object, pencil on paper, 7x20x12 cm
Untitled (Shirt), 2011, object, pencil on paper, 8x20x16 cm
Untited (Sheet of Paper), 2011, pencil on paper, 60x50 cm

French critic Nino Frank is often given credit for coining
the term “film noir” to describe a group of American
crime films that were shown in French theaters in the
forties. He allegated that the novelty of film noir is
that it shifts the burden from the action to creating
expressive model characters e.g.: the detective in
a trench coat or a demonic femme fatale in a satin dress
with a cigarette in her hand. In his drawings Paweł
Olszczyński goes one step further—he abandons the
characters and focuses on their props. These elements
usually appear alone, without “ownership“—a glove
moving along the railing waving limply, revealing
that is empty, filled only with associations, Untitled
(Empty Glove). In Olszczyński’s work items of clothing
subjectively become phantoms of bodies. It is his
private world – a fantôme noir. Olszczyński’s drawings
are therefore the opposite of the classic study of the
model. He is occupied only with what surfaces: drapes,
folds, heels, hair styles and everything that fetishizes.
For the artist fashion is language of Baudrillard
pyramidal simulacrum. It is fetish and artificial. And it
is the superficiality of fashion that fascinates him.
The world of fashion has long reached far into areas of
art. Many designers like Rei Kawakubo, Martin Maison
Margiela or Gareth Pugh are inspired by artworks, and
their collections are often reminiscent of collectable
objects or sculptures. Olszczyński asks, however, what
happens if we reverse the direction of fascination,
if the art falls in love with the fashion? His paper
sculptures are made up of wigs, purses and wallets
and refer to haute couture in fashion. They are as fragile and as transitory as fashion trends. He plays with exclusivity of the handmade
which in the art world is self-evident. He is fascinated by black and the possilibites of the ordinary pencil—sometimes deep black, soft and
velvety, and at others dry, precise and thin as a hair. He also radically juxtaposes the texture of materials like skin, fur and hair. Olszczyński
pulls his favorite motif from fashion magazines which depict unnaturally styled hair–fetishes once again.
He continually returns to this motif while at the same time consciously celebrating the ritual of the obsessive, compulsive repetition, which
manifests itself in a pushy quest for perfected execution. The process of creating drawings is time consuming and laborious—physically
and mentally exhausting. The hair on Olszczyński’s works is tangled, dominating the entire surface of the sheet. While repitition should
satisfy, it provokes anxiety and a feeling of helplessness.
In Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle, the author writes (...) the compulsion to repeat stems from what has been denied and has
appeared in the unconscious. (...) But what is the relation of the pleasure principles with the compulsion to repeat that reveals the power of
denial? It’s obvious that most of what becomes revived as a result of forced repetition is unpleasant to our ego, as it actualizes the functions
of the denied drives; it is however distress which we have already appreciated and which does not contradict the pleasure principle,
a distress for one system, connected with a simultaneous satisfaction of another.
Olszczyński’s strategy is to analyze the drawing medium. His works are a kind of visual tautology: on a piece of paper you see a piece of
drawn paper, folded like a sheet of paper, Untitled (Sheet of Paper), or the drawing of hair that he shapes into the likeness of hair or a wig.
The artist builds objects with his drawings. Ironically, this practice of repetition exposes the limits of mimesis. The more Olszczyński tries
to convince us that a picture is reality, the more it is impossible. As a reward, however, he reveals the natural characteristics of the drawing
medium.
Paweł Olszczyński was born in 1985 in Cracow. He lives and works in Cracow, Poland.
Untitled (Shoes), 2011, pencil on paper, 80x60 cm
back cover: Untitled, 2010, pencil on paper, 50x43 cm
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