This lecture will focus on showing sources of inspirations, creation's methods and video documentations. Along the lecture the performance Horizon 02 will be presented.
[…] Naturally, it is tempting to discuss Karwowski's performances in symbolical terms due to the wealth of archetypal and religious contexts inherent in them. It appears, however, that it is rather the initial, intuitive discussion regarding the presence of the body and the poetics of the materials interacting with it that enables penetration into the secret power of his performances. Indeed, these components of Karwowski's works appear to possess a quality that crosses boundaries and cultural contexts, a type of visual poetry that activates the senses in a manner which does not compel strict interpretation. Karwowski's basic materials-salt, water, ashes, paper, wax, lead, black liquid paint, etc.-come together to generate motion, energy in action: soft, hard, burning or cutting touch; blast, flap, electric shock, etc. The interaction between these materials and the body-intricate relationships of active activation and of submission to the power and qualities of the materials-generates great sensual poetry, a poetical syntax of materiality akin to a journey within the basic moves of the formation of memory and identity.
Indeed, Karwowski's visual poetry constantly refers to a temporal blending-a distant past, replete with both elusive yearning and somber baggage, discernible in its imprint on the present which seeks purification and regeneration. It is a complex reality that moves in an endless circle of erupting energy within a world of contradictory substances; an act which strives to generate some alchemical transformation, although on occasion it is forced to skeptically and ironically admit its limitations. The purification quest often involves melancholy, but it always retains the restraint of a man frankly perusing his life and memories. Thus, the great paradox is exposed time and again: the fine, fragile line between a purifying ritual and the repetitiveness of deadlocked, trapped situations. After all, what had died and disintegrated into dust is sustained as ghosts of a stubborn identity, but also as the present's poetry of life. […]
The Void in-between Memory Materials by Yaron David
♦ Antoni Karwowski presents other three proposals within LP'11: the workshop: Genotype – Source – Genotype from the 9th till the 11th of March at La Porta, the performance Standing at the end of white line 13th of March at 20h at the CCCB and Self-24h performance laboratory the 15th of March , an ocupation along the participants on the workshop of La Porta's space.
