indi ARTE garden

TRACES, SHADOWS, REFLECTIONS

"Independent faith tells me about some faint traces that nothing shall erase them,

in every sphere they unfailingly shall revolve'' (Stachura)


A trace is something that remains. A sign which tells us about the presence.

I am interested in the most delicate and transitory traces. Those that remain just for a moment longer. Sometimes it is even hard to catch or notice them. They are often invisible.

... the shadows of people passing one another, reflections in the water, in the sky, in the clouds.

The whirl of figures in a dance. A street in the rain. A silhouette seen against the sun through the half-closed lids. The window pane of the running train which shows not only the landscape passing by, but also the faces of our fellow travellers. The shadow of a man submerged in the landscape.
There is a painting by Caspar David Friedrich entitled "Two People at the Sea at Moonrise".

Against a horizontal seascape there are two mysterious figures standing, intently looking far into the sea.

An unnamed longing spreads around. I always imagine that over there, on the other side, on the other coast there are people as well. And although they face those two, so much separates them.
I have been always intrigued by a man in a landscape. His otherness from everything that surrounds him conjures up the following questions: 'Where does he come from?' 'Who is he?' 'Where is he going?'

'What is the magic of the spaces that are calling him towards them?' Vastness, infinity, sky, air, wind.

"The sky - enormous, full of lofty existence; reserve of space and surplus of various worlds.

And we, too distant to measure ourselves by form, and standing too close to turn round” (Rilke)

I adore plunging in landscapes which attract me with purity and harmony. I want to take over their strength, freshness and beauty, to achieve absolute tranquillity, to go across the wind, to look, to listen, to be silent.

" I know some people who get off at a station or just jump off a train to enter a landscape which suddenly dazzled them. To be in it. To merge into it. To be one verse. One verse in this poem” (Stachura)

The admiration for the landscape is one of the components of my pictorial art.
Through the profile of the figure which is distinguished from the vibrant space I wished to suggest that eventually we are not the same as what surrounds us, that in us there is something which probably cannot be found in any other form. We do feel sometimes that through a spiritual experience and through art we approach a different existence. We long for something which we merely presuppose.
The transient traces which we leave on the way - our shadows, reflections, glances, smiles - maybe they are that which actually will not disappear. Maybe they will remain in all those places where we existed, in the vast, infinite spaces. Outside all the influences which could annihilate them. Beyond time.

“There will remain, remain forever a reflection in the cloud or in the sky, and by falling the clouds will return, and by rising the sky will fall - at least with the rain, and each drop will retain a tiny image” (Baczynski)

Postscript:
What fascinates me most in painting is an opportunity of decompressing silence.

This silence which hides a whole tangle of confused thoughts and incomprehensible feelings.

And is there a word with which one can express silence?

TRIP TO THE FAR EAST / LOTUS AND THE CITY / FACES

“The face is a trace,

but the trace is washed away.
One does not know who has just passed.
Was it God who passed?
In which direction?
We know only one thing, that these are traces
that lead us to other people.
A meeting is an absolutely direct experience,
it takes place not in a perspective of cognition,
but in a perspective of goodness.
In the situation of the world devastated by the experience
of abandoning, loneliness, suffering, passing –
the answer is: following others’ paths” (Tadeusz Gadacz)

​

What I have most remembered from my trip to the Far East was a MEETING with another person –

pictures of faces. A meeting being a natural flow of energy, a free look, a special smile.

I think about people I have met, most frequently far from big cities, about people living in quiet and remote places, surrounded by high mountains, close to nature.

“Those materially poor people are rich in their hearts. Most of them have nothing and that fact frees them from a concern of possessing something and fear of losing it.
They live a moment and are happy with moments that nobody will ever take away from them”​

When observing their everyday life and rituals, taking photos and talking, I never felt that they treated me as someone strange and unknown.
There were no anxious gazes at me or questions like: “hey you, who are you?” or any willingness to acquire some information: “what are you doing here? where do you come from? what do you do in life?” – such typical questions for our way of thinking when we meet someone.
They reacted to me in such a way as if we had known each other for 1000 years, as if they knew everything about me. There was no need to call things, value or judge. Yet, they asked me about my feelings:

“are you happy? do you like it here? would you like to see something beautiful?”
But, in fact, our communication was non-verbal. This was co-participation and co-feeling.
What I liked most in them was an everlasting warm-hearted smile on their faces.
Radiation of warmth and kindness.
A special smile. Different from the one we often see during sociable meetings or on newspaper covers.

A smile emanating with internal light, calm and harmony.

Soothing. Giving the feeling of proximity and belonging together.
Transitory moment of joint happiness, meetings on the way, in streets, in temples, in monasteries.
Radiating faces and hands in a gesture of welcome – NAMASTE – “God in me bows to God in you” –

these are just the most beautiful feelings I was offered in the Far East.

“While wandering we learn about the world, people, and first of all about us. Every event, meeting of every person changes us, disclosing one more fragment of our mystery.
Wandering is permanent readiness to discover and search – perpetual youth.
In order to wander you don’t have to become rich or poor. This is a condition of mind being free from any attachment, when a reward or loss are accepted with equal satisfaction” (Mal Sunjandar)

FRIEND ALWAYS COMES FROM AFAR