Pictures
Wojciech Nowikowski was born in Poland in 1954. Since graduation in 1986 from the Fine Art Academy in Warsaw the artist has shown his work in several solo and group exhibitions including 1991 'Galleries of the '80s' in Zacheta National Gallery, 1995 'Drawing' in the National Museum and a 1999 solo show in the Polish Cultural Institute in London.
In the 1990s the artist, settled in London and not associated with any gallery, continued working on canvas and, increasingly, on paper. The work, exploring a range of media, was abstract, lyrical and intuitive; the forms it employed were often a hybrid of organic and mechanical.
A significant change brought by interest in colour resulted in the 2002 series of 'flags' and minimalist panels of glossy, immaterial surfaces. What followed was a steady increase in physicality of paint and space, and the emergence of the 'object' in the 2007 series 'Offerings, Trophies'.
In the 2009 show 'Consolations of a Floating Man' five large canvases formed an enclosure. The landscapes engulfed the viewer, at times offering a shelter, at times masking unknown menace. In doing so the works aimed to create a feeling of floating, a fragile balance between resignation and hope.
The 2011 series of paintings (‘Along the Danube: remembering the immensity of the world’) finds its origin in family history and is a reflection on memory and fantasy, chance and fate.
In the recent series ( 'Transitions' 2013 and 'Late Harmonies' 2014) the paintings, made of thin layers of diluted paint, are translucent and fluid. The artist seems preoccupied with notions of transience, change and uncertainty.
From 2001 until 2012 Nowikowski was an associate lecturer in the University of the Arts London. In 2004 he founded in Warsaw the 'Empty Workshop' (Pracownia Pusta), a non-profit space devoted to promoting contemporary art. Since 2013 Nowikowski has been living and working in New York.
