Krzysztof Franaszek is a well-known Polish conceptual artist, whose works belong to many private and institutional collections. When creating sculptural objects, video recordings, and installations, Krzysztof analyses the interactions between a person and its surrounding space. He is interested in the opposition, arising from the clash between the creative energy and the destructive forces of time and nature. The motif of the city is also prevalent in the works of the artist: analysing the nature of a human being and its relationship with an artificially-created environment, Krzysztof creates totems, installations, and abstractions. They reflect the topics of human nature and its adaptation in different spaces.

Exhibition Trapped Surfaces presents Krzysztof Franaszek’s recent exploration of parallels between the city space and cosmos. The point of inspiration for the title of the exhibition Trapped Surfaces became the term of cosmology, defining the surface of the black hole, which, due to its physical qualities, is not reflective. Endless cosmic space and natural entities that have formed in it has inspired the artist to look at the city as an artificially formed and closed space. From the first look, the city is a pulsating, live organism, its bloodstream consists of the series of the illuminated screen and roadways covering the surface. However, from the point of view of nature, confined urban spaces and constructions forming that space traps carbon, calcium, sand and light shaped surfaces becoming a parallel to the cosmic space. Using the materials that shape the city and the light, the artist constructs sculptural objects and installations that are unusual for the human eye, dimly lit. A contrast between the matter and the light shaping it, creates an alternative world, closely resembling the space.

Krzysztof Franaszek (b. 1981) is an artist who holds a PhD in fine arts from the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts (2013). Since 2006 he is a lecturer at his Alma Mater in Warsaw, and since 2013, Head of the Space Arrangement, Sculpture and Drawing Studio at the Faculty of Graphic Design of University of Applied Information Technology and Management. Franaszek had worked for some time in a studio with a well-known contemporary multimedia artist Christian Jankowski in Stuttgart. So far, he has participated in over ten collective exhibitions and projects around the world: Poland, Germany, the Netherlands, USA, Russia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Bangladesh, India and other countries. He introduced his works in eight personal exhibitions, including the Center for Contemporary Art in Warsaw, gallery Studio and Le Guern. The artist is also the winner of the scholarships from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

This personal exhibition of Krzysztof Franaszek is a part of a bilateral exchange project between (AV17) Gallery in Vilnius and Le Guern Gallery in Warsaw. On November 20, the exhibition of a Vilnius-based conceptual sculptor Rafal Piesliak was opened in Le Guern in Warsaw. In it, by resurrecting old porcelain vessels to new life and giving them a sculptural body, the artist analyzes and reshapes historical artifacts and the meanings of loss and rebirth.

The exhibition of Krzysztof Franaszek Trapped Surfaces will be open in (AV17) Gallery until 13 January 2022.
The project is co-funded by the Lithuanian Council for Culture.

Krzysztof Franaszek