Roman Opałka | |
|---|---|
.png) Opałka in 1995 | |
| Born | (1931-08-27)27 August 1931 |
| Died | 6 August 2011(2011-08-06) (aged 79) |
| Nationality | Polish, French |
| Known for | PaintingContemporary Art |
| Awards | Commander in theOrdre des Arts et des Lettres, Paris (2009) Gold Medal of the Cultural Merit "Gloria Artis", Warsaw (2009) Special Prize of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland (1996) Goslarer Kaiserring, Germany (1993) National Prize of Painting, Paris (1991) |
| Website | opalka1965 |
Roman Opałka (Polish:[ˈrɔman ɔˈpawka]; 27 August 1931 – 6 August 2011) was aFrench-bornPolish painter, whose works are mostly associated withconceptual art.
Opałka was born on 27 August 1939 inAbbeville-Saint-Lucien, France, to Polish parents. The family returned to Poland in 1946 and Opałka studiedlithography at a graphics school before enrolling in the School of Art and Design inŁódź. He later earned a degree from theAcademy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. He moved back to France in 1977.[1] Opałka lived inTeille, nearLe Mans, andVenice.[2] He died at age 79 after falling ill while on holiday inItaly. He was admitted to a hospital nearRome and died there a few days later, on 6 August 2011.[1]
In 1965, in his studio inWarsaw, Opałka began paintingnumbers from one toinfinity. Starting in the top left-hand corner of thecanvas and finishing in the bottom right-hand corner, the tiny numbers were painted in horizontal rows. Each new canvas, which the artist called a "detail", took up counting where the last left off. Each "detail" has the same size(196 × 135 cm), the dimension of his studio door in Warsaw. All details have the same title,"1965 / 1 – ∞"; the project had no definable end, and the artist pledged his life to its ongoing execution: "All my work is a single thing, the description from number one to infinity. A single thing, a single life", "the problem is that we are, and are about not to be". He had contemplated and tried many different ways to visualize time before settling on this life's work.[3]
Over the years there were changes to the process. In Opałka's first details he painted white numbers onto a black background. In 1968 he changed to a grey background "because it's not asymbolic colour, nor an emotional one", and in 1972 he decided that he would gradually lighten this grey background by adding 1% more white to the ground with each passing detail. He expected to be painting virtually in white on white by the time he reached7777777 (he did not use commas or number breaks in the works): "My objective is to get up to the white on white and still be alive." As of July 2004, he had reached 5.5 million.[2] Adopting this rigorously serialized approach, Opałka aligned himself with other artists of the time who explored makingart through systems andmathematics, likeDaniel Buren,On Kawara, andHanne Darboven.[4] He was represented in Paris and New York byYvon Lambert[5] and in Venice by Galleria Michela Rizzo.
In 1968 Opałka introduced to the process atape recorder, speaking each number into themicrophone as he painted it, and also began taking passport-style photographs of himself standing before the canvas after each day's work.
In 2007 Opałka participated at the symposium "Personal Structures Time–Space–Existence" a project initiated by the artist Rene Rietmeyer.
The final number he painted was5607249.[6]
Opałka participated in many of the art world’s most important international exhibitions, includingDocumenta in Kassel, Germany, in 1977; theSão Paulo Bienal in 1987; and theVenice Biennale, in 1995, 2003, 2011 and 2013.[4] He was represented in Paris and New York by Yvon Lambert,[5] in Venice by Galleria Michela Rizzo and, for many years, at John Weber in New York.
In 2003,Les Rencontres d'Arles exhibited his work through"L’œuvre photographique"'s exhibition (the curator was Alain Julien-Laferrière).
In 2017, Opałka has made part of the exhibition "Il mio corpo nel tempo / Lüthi Ontani Opalka", Galleria d'Arte Moderna, Verona 2017. Catalogue Manfredi Edizioni.
Opałka's works can be found in the permanent collections of theCentre Pompidou in Paris and New York’sMuseum of Modern Art among others.
Opałka won the celebrated Grand Prize of the 7th International Biennial of Arts and Graphics of Cracow in 1969, the C. K. Norwid Art Critics Award in 1970, Franceʼs National Painting Prize in 1991 and GermanyʼsGoslarer Kaiserring in 1993. He was named Commander of theOrdre des Arts et des Lettres (Order of Arts and of Letters) in France. In 2009, he was awardedMedal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis by the Minister of Culture and National HeritageBogdan Zdrojewski. In 2011, thePresident of PolandBronisław Komorowski awarded him with Commander's Cross of theOrder of Polonia Restituta. In 2011 Opalka was awarded by theEuropean Cultural Centre Art Award for his life long depiction of "Time Passing".[7]
In 2005 the German art project "Camera Obscura 2005/1-∞" was initiated as an homage to Opałka's life and work.[8] It honours his"1965 / 1 – ∞" work by sellingcamera obscuras — with two pinholes — over the internet auction platformeBay. Each pinhole is sold to another buyer, and the camera is subsequently sent back to the project to be developed and exhibited in its gallery, as well as online.[8]
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