The presented sculpture depicting a skull was created in 2021 according to the design and pattern of Franciszek Starowieyski under the supervision of the artist's sons. The sculpture, made in a limited edition (8 + 4 sculptures in the author's edition), is a contemporary version of the work created as part of Franciszek Starowieyski's 1975 sculptural happening, during which a spectacularly sized skull was displayed on the wall of one of Warsaw's apartment blocks, as documented by photographs by Jaroslaw Tarania from the collection of the KARTA Center.
Franciszek Starowieyski is one of the most important Polish artists of the 20th century. His work and the controversy it aroused fired the imagination of Poles for many decades. He was an outstanding painter, draughtsman, graphic artist, creator of posters and theatrical and television scenery, an expert and collector of 17th-century art. Considered the most outstanding representative of the Polish School of Posters, Franciszek Starowieyski is the first Pole to have a solo exhibition at the prestigious MOMI-e in New York (1985).
His work is filled with motifs taken from Baroque painting, often enriched with surrealist elements. He first introduced Baroque-Surrealist elements into poster art in his work Frank V (1962), where he depicted a combination of architecture and a skull. The skull, along with skeletons, was his favorite motif; the artist was eager to use this symbol in his works, and it appears in posters such as Red Magic, Scorpion, Maiden and Archer, and Two Musketeers, among others. His skulls are hybridized, often inhuman, cow-like or bird-like, and surprisingly turn into shells, coming to life, growing out of non-energetic bodies. They are also an expression of adoration for the art of the 17th century, when they reigned supreme as one of the most frequently depicted symbols of transience
Each object comes with a certificate of authenticity signed by the artist's sons.
