Textural composition XXIII

Kompozycja fakturowa XXIII (1958) – an abstract relief – is one of the key pieces created by Bronisław Kierzkowski, who is believed to be one of the matter painters. 1957 marked the start of his use of the characteristic technique of relief in plaster. Initially, he tried to incorporate colour but soon abandoned paint and a brush, creating monochromatic picture-objects out of non-painting, non-artistic materials. Colour in these works exists only through chiaroscuro effects, while lines are defined by the materials used in the compositions. He created textured stucco works with pebbles, wires, metal nets and industrial stencils embedded into them, creating dynamic, original assemblages on the intersection between painting and sculpture. In the mid-1950s Kierzkowski travelled to North Africa, where the vast desert spaces in subdued monochromatic colours left a strong impression on him and left their mark on his work. Kierzkowski's work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York as part of the 15 Polish Painters and The Art of Assemblage exhibitions in 1961, as well as at the Painting and Sculpture exhibition in 1965. The American art curator William C. Seitz wrote that Kierzkowski's reliefs have something out of the raw nature of the desert landscape and if there are any traces of life in them, they are skeletons or fossils left on the sun-burnt sand. Kierzkowski also made monumental sculptures and spatial installations – some of them were moving and combined with sound.

Marlena Chybowska-Butler