The cycle comprises sixteen prints based on Polish postcards from the interwar period, selected by the artist from the digitised collection of the National Digital Library Polona. Having made the selection, Bohdanowicz interfered in them, marrying contemporary cultural symbols with archival imagery.
The titular imitation surfaces on several levels. When viewed on a digital screen, the prints appear to be small format works, whereas in reality they are printed 70 x 100cm. Bohdanowicz decided to use coarse raster, thanks to which from up close the images look just like a collection of loosely connected coloured spots merging into clusters. As one steps further and further away from them, the spots begin to form more precise shapes, and reemerge as postcards again.
This is somewhat paradoxical, as we usually need to take a close look at a postcard in order to see the details. In the case of Imitation of Truth, this mechanism is reversed and we can only see the full image if we move away – the first imitation.
Individual images include specific references to 21st century pop cultural codes, such as two high-rises being approached by a plane, injected into the Lviv cityscape.
I amended the conventional landscapes with grotesque visions from the intersection of oneirism, fantasy, and contemporary imagery. The traditional collage toolset may have been substituted by technology here, but the spirit is the same.
– Bohdanowicz commented.
The technique and form of the works corresponds with their content, which, upon closer investigation, gains an additional meaning. At a first glance, Bohdanowicz's works bring to mind the collage imaginarium of Jan Dziaczkowski. One can nevertheless identify two distinct differences. First of all, as opposed to Dziaczkowski, Bohdanowicz does not create new worlds or tell imaginary stories, but creates a real world which has recently reemerged.
The fundamental question that comes to mind after viewing Bohdanowicz's graphic works is: ‘is this what happened?’ The contemporary elements introduced to the archival images blend in seamlessly. A flying saucer looks like a logical part of the landscape, while the Hindenburg's intervention does not surprise, as this is what ’it must have looked like’ more than half a century ago. The punctum – a crucial detail redefining the whole composition – of these images seems to lie in Bohdanowicz's touch.
The postcards which the artist used were based on photographs from that time. Thus, photography, which in itself is a representation of reality, becomes a reference point for the author. The final images can therefore be regarded as a meta-meta-meta-commentary on the existing world: an artistic intervention as a commentary on a postcard which is a commentary on photography. It calls for:
an attempt to read the images not just through the prism of one's own knowledge and cultural predispositions (essential to an interpretation of any image), but also by incorporating one's own perception, intelligence, the aptitude to identify the odd elements, as well as the ability to generate associations which are unexpectedly distant from the initial ones
– Bohdanowicz says, expressing his belief in his viewers' eloquence.
The period of the creation of the originals is also significant. The postcards that became the background for the artist's experiments come from the interwar period, the beginning of the dadaist and surrealist tendencies. The author consciously chose the least surrealist, most ‘ordinary’ pictures, which originally lacked the aforementioned punctum.
Simultaneously to Imitation of Truth, the artist was working on the series Takie są fakty (Such are the Facts). The technique and process of creating both series was similar, however in the case of the latter, he based his collages on physical archives of the Museum of the Region of Zbąszyń and Kozioł Area (which he explored during a private visit). The artist later exhibited his works there, and observed the audience's reception, as if he was conducting an in vivo experiment.
The prints were received as if they were photographs, and considered to be quite believable, just enlarged postcards from the town in Greater Poland. At a first glance, the Tesco advertisement printed in Gothic font was not even remotely suspicious, neither was the presence of a tram. One could only hear the members of public asking one another: ‘do you remember where this was?’
Maciej Bohdanowicz belongs to the group of artists who engage in a game with the public and ask questions without giving any answers. The artist also pays attention to the collage technique and its possibilities, which have significantly expanded together with developments in digital technology. He draws that which was and which is together again, even though there is a chance that neither really ever took place.