Andrzej Wróblewski

The works by Andrzej Wróblewski presented at the exhibition were created after the famous Executions series and bear a clear reference to Socialist Realist doctrine. They are nevertheless murky, existential, devoid of the heroism and optimism of Socialist Realist imagery. The pieces have a profoundly humanistic dimension and confront the inevitability of human fate. The painting Mothers, displayed at the Polish National Exhibition of Young Visual Arts "Against War, Against Fascism", is the first of a series of works depicting the wartime fate of women and mothers mourning their children. Attention, It’s Coming! provides a visual record of the memory of a wartime raid, but concerns not so much the experience itself as the impossibility of depicting it. Wróblewski seeks to develop a new manner of communication, attempting to unite the artist and the viewer by showing that they are both survivors of the same ordeal.

Andrzej Wróblewski (b. 1927 in Wilno, d. 1957 in the Tatra Mountains) – Polish painter, art historian and critic. He lived in Wilno (now Vilnius) during World War II and, as a fourteen-year-old boy, witnessed his father’s death from a heart attack during a search of their apartment. In 1945 Wróblewski moved to Kraków, where he studied art history at Jagiellonian University and painting at the Academy of Fine Art at the same time. Following his studies, he continued teaching at the academy. An experimenter, Wróblewski revolted against the domination of Colourism in academic teaching and sought an art that engaged with reality. He made use of Socialist Realist forms, developing his own distinctive poetics. He died an untimely death at age twenty-nine, probably from a heart attack, while walking along the Oswald Balzer Road in the Tatra Mountains.