A pioneering work in developing an interactive environment for collaboration, merging painting with spatial sound, generative composition, and interaction.
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This audiovisual installation results from a collaboration between two Wrocław-based artists: painter Lech Twardowski and programmer Paweł Janicki. It combines means of expression typical of the visual arts with spatial sound, generative composition, and interaction.
It’s a monumental installation consisting of large-format objects formed from 400 kilometers of paper tape painted by the artist, exhibited “on a stiletto,” in a way that creates grooves of a kind of overscaled plate – a dynamic record of information and emotions. The cumulative painterly record of time and gesture – a daily year-long process of painting by Lech Twardowski, powerfully emanating object-modules simultaneously confront its energy with the action of interactive media.
It consists of a painting object, a wooden platform with a projection screen made of salt placed in its center, and three hanging painting objects with a restored software based on infrared sensors. Those sensors control the sound composition and projections. Live-generated images and sounds represent the flow of energy and provoke the audience to spontaneous emotional reactions, resulting in further “amplification” of the visual and soundtrack.
Lech Twardowski was born in Brodnica, Poland, 1952 and grew up in Grudziądz. He studied at the Fine Arts Academy in the studio class of Professor Zbigniew Karpinski, left for Paris in 1983, and came back to live in Wroclaw in 1995. His work includes paintings, art installations, and performances. Lech employs a variety of media and techniques. He explores theatre performance spaces and works with musicians. Lech Twardowski’s paintings and art objects can be found in the following public collections: the National Museum in Warsaw, the National Museum in Wroclaw, the Modern Art Museum in Paris, the Lower Silesian Society for the Encouragement of Arts, as well as in private collections in Poland and abroad.
Paweł Janicki draws mainly on the achievements of music, contemporary and media art, and posthumanist practice – but constructs different forms. He engages a broad spectrum of techniques, approaches, and protocols: he creates works using synthetic senses, programming techniques – including in their modern, cognitive incarnation – and space and materials engineering elements. Historical and current contexts play an essential role in Janicki’s work – particularly the perceived history of art and what might be called the history of thinking.
He is affiliated with the WRO Art Center, where he is a curatorial board member, and presented the solo exhibition Point Nemo in 2020. He curated the Polish Pavilion at the 2024 Gwangju Biennale. His recent affiliations include institutions such as Funken Academy, Fraunhofer IWU, and the pan-European ArtCast4D/AAASeed project. In 2024, he curated the Polish Pavilion at the Gwangju 2024 Biennale in South Korea. His institutional collaborations and presentations include NASA (USA), Ars Electronica (Austria), Transmediale (Germany), Sapporo International Art Festival (Japan), and Khoj (India). The Society of Algorithm lists his network performances among the key events in developing this art genre.
