Reflections on Everyman: The Work of Jan Sawka

 Reflections on Everyman: The Work of Jan Sawka

September 12 – December 14, 2013
Curated by Evonne M. Davis and Hanna Maria Sawka

Opening Reception September 12, 7-10 PM

New Media Screening October 12, 7 PM

Closing Reception December 14, details TBA

Newark, NJ: Gallery Aferro’s Main Gallery and New Media Room
will feature a major retrospective celebrating the life and work of
artist, expatriate, activist, architect and impossible-to-classify Jan
Sawka (1946-2012). Sawka's body of work includes paintings, book arts,
sculptures, engravings, editorial illustrations, architectural
installations, monuments, new media and a 10-story stage set designed
for the Grateful Dead.  Currently, a memorial exhibition of his work is
on view at The National Museum in Krakow, Poland. This exhibition is
presented in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute, and with
support from the Polish American Business Club and the Polish Slavic
Federal Credit Union.

 Born in 1946 in Zabrze, Poland, his childhood overshadowed by his
father's Stalin-era political imprisonment, by his 20’s Sawka had become
the youngest member of the Polish Poster School.  Sawka’s portrayal in
his art of the impact of totalitarianism on the individual led to his
expulsion from Poland in 1976.  Having just won the “Oscar de la
Peinture” in France, he was given a residency at the newly opened
Pompidou Center in Paris.  In 1977, he arrived in New York with his wife
and baby, four suitcases and a portfolio of artworks. Within a year, he
became a prolific editorial illustrator for The New York Times. While
producing paintings at his home studio, he designed posters and sets for
the Jean Cocteau Repertory Theater, Harold Clurman Theater, and Samuel
Beckett Theater, where he collaborated closely with Beckett.  By this
time, he had built a gallery career in New York, Los Angeles and many
other cities. 

In 1981, when Martial Law was imposed in Poland, the AFL-CIO sold
Sawka's Solidarity Poster in the millions to provide immediate support
to the besieged Solidarity movement. In 1993, he created his first full
multi-media spectacle in Japan. At the time of his death the artist was
working on numerous projects. Sawka's works are in over 60 museums
around the world and he had over 70 solo exhibitions. The exhibition
will focus on Jan Sawka’s concern with the human condition in today’s
world, with examples of his paintings, prints and sculptures. 

As the late Professor James Beck of Columbia University wrote “He
contemplates and dissects the social conditions of our moment – the
absurdities of political states, the leadership, the courts, the
universities – within the context of the individual caught in the
labyrinth… such a condition is not differentiated from the absurdities
of more human interaction, between lovers, husbands and wives.  The
isolation is there too, perhaps even more so: the absence of
communication, the uniformity, the blandness, the emptiness… Here too is
the softened, approachable world of physical beauty, of delicacy,
refinement and sensitivity.  These two struggle with one another… in
Sawka’s irresistible art.”

Gallery Aferro is a nonprofit artist-originated organization serving a diverse community through the import and
export of ideas. The gallery is located at 73 Market St Newark NJ, and
is open Thursday-Saturday 12:00-6PM and by appt, free of charge. info@aferro.org 973 353 9533