A semi-fictional recreation of the work and life of the polish constructivist and alpinist Mieczysław Szczuka, whose œuvre has been mostly lost.

After his premature death during a climb in 1927, his widow moved to Paris, taking with her most of Szczuka’s works. Having disappeared because of the war, these works have never been found again.

For a 2014 performance at the Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź entitled Szczuka’s chest, I claimed to have discovered in Paris the lost chest containing Szczuka’s œuvre, sketches of unrealized works, but also film reels and photographs documenting various moments of his life.

I use the actually available information about Szczuka as a starting point, bridging the gap of the unknown with fiction and producing Spatial constructions based on old blurry photographs, sketches of unrealized Monuments based on textual descriptions, or reenactments based on archival material. Two significant chapters of Szczuka’s life are reenacted: his gun duel with a poet and his last fatal climb in the Tatras mountains.

This process of reproduction echoes a project Szczuka himself initiated in the 1920’s: the project of a Museum of Reproduction for “every meaningful art work mankind has ever produced”.

01
Museum of reproduction, exhibition view, Asymetria Gallery, Warsaw, 2013, photo: Błażej Pindor
02
Szczuka’s chest, 2014
03
Dźwignia n°5 -1927, 2013, inkjet print on paper, 17 x 24 cm
04
13.08.1927, 2013, 16 mm film, 09’21’’
05
13.08.1927, exhibition view, Karlin Studios, Prague, 2015, photo: Jiří Thýn
06
Szczuka’s chest, 2014
07
Mieczysław Szczuka, "Project for a Monument to Freedom", 1922-1923, 2013, wood, steel, 108 x 53 x 71 cm, photo: Aurélien Mole
08
Mieczysław Szczuka, “Spatial Construction”, 1922, 2013, wood, glass, steel, 48 x 33 x 81 cm, photo: Aurélien Mole
09
Mieczysław Szczuka, “Spatial Construction”, 1922, 2013, wood, steel, 43 x 30 x 57 cm photo: Aurélien Mole
10
Duel, 1924, 2013, 16 mm film, 02’36’’
11
Szczuka’s chest (Project for a Monument to Karl Liebknecht, 1923), 2014, pencil on paper, 18 x 24 cm
12
Szczuka’s chest (Project for a Monument to Fyodor Dostoyevsky, 1923), 2014, pencil on paper, 18 x 24 cm
13
Szczuka’s chest (Project for a Monument to Max Stirner, 1923), 2014, pencil on paper, 18 x 24 cm
14
Museum of reproduction, exhibition view, Asymetria Gallery, Warsaw, 2013, photo: Błażej Pindor
Index