Roman Cieślewicz, "Moda Polska", photo: press materials
The retrospective of works by Roman Cieśliewicz at the Royal College of Art comprises over 150 major works by one of the most influential graphic artists of the 20th Century
Over 150 major works from Roman Cieślewicz's extensive oeuvre will be on display in London at the Royal College of Art this summer. The retrospective explores the life and work of one of the key figures in the history of graphic design. This landmark exhibition will be the first major retrospective of Cieślewicz's work in Britain. Working first in Warsaw and then in Paris, Cieślewicz was at the heart of artistic life in both cities. Spanning a career that bridged the Cold War division of Europe, he brought surrealist fantasy to the stolid visual culture of communist Poland and, when he arrived in Paris in 1963, he contributed a critical perspective on the consumerist influence of the West.
Cieślewicz was - alongside Fernando Arrabal and Alejandro Jodorowsky - a member of Panique, the 'last' surrealist group in France. At the same time he served as art director at Elle and a contributor to Vogue. Remarkably prolific, he also worked closely with figures from the worlds of advertising and fashion, including Guy Bourdin and Helmut Newton.
Extraordinarily talented as an image-maker, Cieślewicz's tools were not the pen or the brush but the scalpel and scissors. Working with collage, he produced compelling and original images by reworking familiar icons such Che Guevara or Mona Lisa. "I always go for the maximum image and maximum information. You need to stimulate the imagination to the maximum", he once said in an interview.
In the last ten years of his life he developed a sharply critical view of the influence of the media, most notably in his penetrating study of the "society of spectacle" "Pas de Nouvelles - Bonnes Nouvelles" ("No News is Good News", 1986), an exhibition and book project which maintains its relevance today.
Throughout his career he produced powerful political statements about the dignity of humanity in the face of injustice, creating such major works as public projections on Paris landmarks for the bicentennial anniversary of the French Revolution in 1989.
The exhibition will feature film and cinema posters produced in Poland during the 1950s and 1960s, including his classic design for Hitchcock's Vertigo, collage illustrations for a number of classic works of 20th century literature including Bruno Schulz's Street of Crocodiles and Anatole France's Les Dieux ont Soif ("The Gods Are Athirst"), iconic magazine covers and promotional graphics for the Centre Georges Pompidou from the late 1970s.
The majority of the exhibits come from the largest and most important collection of his works in the National Museum in Poznań. Some of the exhibited pieces also come from the Museum of Art in Łódź and the private collection of Cezary Pieczyński.
Cieślewicz had over one hundred solo exhibitions and participated in all major poster biennales in the world. His works can be found in the collections of the Polish National Museums in Warsaw, Krakow, Poznań, Wrocław, the Poster Museum in Warsaw, and in the Museum of Art in Łódź and in major international collections such as Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), New York Museum of Modern Art, Musée d'Arts Décoratifs in Paris, Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, Library of Congress in the USA and Musée de Grenoble in Grenoble.
Curators: David Crowley, Andrzej Klimowski, Jeff Willis (RCA) and Anna Grabowska-Konwent (National Museum in Poznań).
The exhibition, which runs between July 16 and August 7, 2010, is co-organised by the Polish Cultural Institute and the Adam Mickiewicz Institute as part of POLSKA! YEAR.
Royal College of Art
Kensington Gore
London SW7 2EU
Source: press materials.