ProfiLab TIFF Open
Living Room
140 rooms in Hotel Asystenta keep stories of this place and its tenants.
Marcin Fajfruk shows them like individual compositions and pulsating
visual structure.
The series of photographs “Living Room” is a photographic record of 140 empty rooms of a currently non-existent Hotel Asystent of a school in Wroclaw. Uninhabited rooms have the same architectural scheme. Without furniture and personal items they maintained characteristic, personal quality: color of walls, particularly painted details, covering and carpets, hanging lamps. If you look closely at these “post-views” (artist’s expression) they start emanating with individual stories and creating a narrative connected to the place and its inhabitants.
A lot is happening in the visual layer. Each frame – should we use an “analog” term – is a unique, painterly composition. However, geometric order of the photography series creates a dynamic rhythm of color transformations, psychedelic, trance pulsation. The English title uncovers further meanings.
The conceptual and inter-media aspect of the project is curious, as well as its placement in wide perspective of avant-garde art of the 20th century. Many associations come to mind: pop art, conceptual art, minimalism. Similarly to Andy Warhol, Marcin Fajfruk was intrigued by repetition of a seemingly banal topic. He recorded it rigorously, intuitively feeling the strength of a hundred and something frames. The process of taking these frames was like meditation. It took about a week, a couple of hours every day, enabling the author to deeply experience time and space. Other art reference could be the recording of a week-long painting event by John Baldessari, a well-known American conceptual artist, called “Six Colorful Inside Jobs” (1971) where the artist paints a room to a different color every day.
Assuming that the frames are cinematographic in its character (changes in identical rooms), the artistic and curator conclusion, and the media development of the project is a stop-motion animation accompanying the exhibition, based on the photographs. Author expands it through a dedicated website – where you can watch all the photos, frame after frame. Website starts on 1st September 2016.
Mariusz Jodko
Marcin Fajfruk – born 1978. In 2003 graduated with honors from University of Zielona Gora, Faculty of Arts, course in graphics. He deals both with classic media and intermedia. His works have been exhibited in Italy, Istanbul, Moscow, Wroclaw, Szczecin. Lives and works in Wroclaw.
Mariusz Jodko – born 1958, philosopher, curator, graphic designer, photograph, filmmaker, creator of multimedia. Originator /along with Alicja Jodko/ of Entropia Gallery – Cultural Institution of City Wroclaw, a place to share and present contemporary art in a wide spectrum of ideas, media and techniques. He has been managing and curating the Gallery since 1988. Gives lectures on new media at Academy of Fine Arts in Wroclaw, a long time member of the Artistic Council of Dolnoslaskie Towarzystwo Zachety Sztuk Pieknych [tran. Lower-Silesian Association for Promotion of Fine Arts]. In 2011 he was rewarded by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage for promoting Polish contemporary art and young artists.
Marcin Fajfruk
Living Room / ProfiLab TIFF Open
curator: Mariusz Jodko
1 – 16 September 2016
Entropia Gallery
4 Rzeźnicza Street, Wrocław
