⚙️ Jacek Obraniak, An Attempt at Dialogue, 2026, steel wire, gourd, bulrush, pine needles, thread, rubber, linen, electric motors and actuators, analogue programming and drive system, 2x 45 x 45 x 45 cm 🗣️🗣️
⚡️Electromechanical assistance: Janusz Hetman
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@tuzola
🚖On view as part of Jacek Obraniak solo show at Polana Institute 🚖
~ The Door is Closed, the Vent Window is Open ~
🚦April 17 — May 16, 2026🚦
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“Sometimes we’re barely apparitions. As if the words had not yet hatched, the trails of vowels not yet blazed, the leaves of consonants not yet sprung; as if commas and periods had not yet flown in, nor throat-clearings, grimaces, whispers, and the rest of speech and script. Not just yet. We appear; dawns find us, and light bulbs too, and sometimes even eyes find us—more often than human these would be mouse’s, worm’s or reptile’s eyes. What does that say about us, what does it say about the world? Nothing, as words don’t exist yet, let alone—pff—writings.
Horrors are robust, shadows trail beyond the world, someone has drunk a warm beer. The abyss misses one ‘s,’ for there are no letters yet and no one will notice; it becomes abys, and this abys drags the rest of the figures and surroundings into the sacred space. A space fit for Gilgamesh, and fit for Isa too, fit for their looking into each other’s eyes—though the eyes can be random and do not see who’s looking through them. The eyes do not know who’s looking through them.
And then you exit. And the language returns, or is begotten. And the writing returns, or is begotten. One can write this text. Men and women smoke cigarettes. Something dawns on them. The backs are hunched. The shoulder blades rise, the collarbones sink. A gaze down, into the dust, the gaze of a streetlamp hit by a truck. One may feel like a Mandaean savior, like John the Baptist with his head on a platter. It is the gaze of that head.
The shafts of our boots go up to our knees. The knees yearn for prayers. The prayers are curt, as if barked out. The shafts are charred with dusk, shadows and heavy words. To you. Take a look. As we look for ourselves.”
Accompanying text: Paweł Sołtys
Translation: Michał Biela
