The Next Now

Gizela Mickiewicz is currently working on a cycle of sculptures made of materials that have been invented and patented in the course of the last few decades. So far, none of these materials has been used to any greater extent, for instance in industry. Materials obtained as a result of laboratory experiments have unique physical properties, but their practical potential remains unexploited. Mickiewicz uses them in order to create peculiar sculpted self-portraits. The form of her works constitutes a sublimation of the properties of the given material, such as considerable lightness coupled with resistance, plasticity coupled with durability. At the level of meanings, her subtle and formally refined works of art are surprising indeed. Materials fashioned into the forms of minimalist works of art do not evoke concrete associations, because they cannot be referred to any practical purpose known from real life. What the viewer encounters is a semantic enigma in a sculptural form.