Joanna Ciechanowska

Against the Odds

Nobody could really imagine it, let alone predict it. Everybody thought it would just pass. And then, it all went wrong. Even now, it’s hard to see the light. Some say, ’you are lucky, at least you have something to do, you can paint’. Except that it is not really about ’having something to do’. I walk, paint, sleep, paint, eat, paint, wash, paint, talk, paint, watch, paint, think, paint…. Can’t help it. It had always been like that, so what’s so different now? Quiet. The night falls but the beasts won’t go to sleep. Old ghosts coming out of the closet and wander around the studio, fighting their way onto the canvas. The old memories I never knew existed, suddenly coming to the surface. My mind drifted to Svalbard and the cold island of Spitsbergen, which I was lucky to visit few years ago. Somehow, it came to occupy my imaginary landscapes and all I could do was to transfer it onto the canvas. The format changed, too. All of a sudden, it shrunk and became smaller, as though I was trying to capture the essence of one thought at the time. Painting at night, in pyjamas, forgetting what is the time, the day, the week, the month… The year? Where has it gone?

Being on my own I tend to walk everywhere. Shadows crossing through the park, the river trail, the lake surrounded by old willows, swans paired for life. Lockdown unleashed my primitive, predatory instincts for collecting images. I steal them from the parks, the river, the sky at night. I became the thief of peoples faces, expressions, fleeting words overheard in passing. I look at the sky, Lapis Lazuli, the earth under my feet, Paynes Grey, river mixing Indigo with streaks of Ultramarine, the sun exploding in Cadmium Yellow. But maybe it had always been like that, I just didn’t notice. I’ve lost three friends and haven’t been able to go to their funeral. It seems that people don’t die, they just disappear, erased, painted over. I forgot the cat. The Cat is gone too, but she creeps into every painting now and again, refusing to leave. Day by day, months disappear, autumn or winter, or…. is it summer now? Nothing what seemed important is important anymore. Exhibitions disappear, galleries closed, it seems we can live without them, but…. can we? The importance of close contact have never been made so visible. Can Zoom replace all that? Virtual reality is becoming our reality but suddenly the real world fights back. What is really important? Zoom or doom? Suddenly everybody is talking, talking, talking…. ethics, politics, social engineering, protests about everything. I feel like leaving, disappearing, evaporating. There is this feeling that I don’t need anything anymore and nothing is important. My doctor friend said, ’viruses need a chance, too’. I listen to Leonard Cohen. There is no one left to blame. I don’t need a reason for what I became.

Art is not a distraction, not the ’something to do’, it has suddenly made it to the altar, bare, stripped from decorations, fake pretensions. I want to do it that way, and don’t give a flying f… And I still have a lot to do, all of a sudden. No excuses left anymore, no more ’I don’t have time because I have to go to…..’, because there is nowhere to go. So, back to basics. Back to what I really want to say. I think, the art I produce has always been connected to storytelling. I found an old magazine with an interview where I finish: ’I would really like to tell the whole story’… and that article was written before my travels around the world. Right now, I feel like I have a pile of old stories that need the power of image to bring them back to life. This is really what lockdown has brought out; the inside is out. I hope it doesn’t look too frightening. So, because it’s broken, it gets real. Precious, scars visible, but still living, like the Japanese art of Kintsugi.

Joanna Ciechanowska, Against the Odds