Peckham, South London’s up-and-coming hub for independent arts and culture, is welcoming works by Piotr Łakomy in two of its venues. The Sunday Painter is an artist-run gallery, based in its permanent quarters in Blenheim Grove since 2010. The Poznań-based artist’s show Life Size Shadow includes a collection of works made out a material that is typical for him: polystyrene.
The black material carries architectural weight, but nevertheless "when touched with a hand, gives off heat, like a body." The sculptor creates forms that play with one’s senses: looking monumental, at the same time they manage to convey lightness, motion – and gravity that can be found in minimal art. Łakomy juxtaposes polystyrene with light bulbs, which add compositional and dramatic tension to the sculptures.
In Observing Self, two bulbs are mounted on a sofa-like structure; by flashing on and off, they cast shadows and light onto one another. The story intrinsic to this piece is that of "neighbours" – mechanically steered objects that somehow turn into melancholy characters, searching for and peeking upon one another, looking for the other’s company.
Michał Lasota writes about the piece:
We can identify here all the principal subjects addressed by the artist: meeting, communication effort, energy flow, and isolation. Interpersonal relations in Łakomy’s work seem to look like collisions of two kinds of matter, hence the surfaces and blocks full of holes, charred edges and exposed damage. The underlying decision to express oneself by means of a limited number of elements is coupled with a passion for developing motifs, whose repository expands slowly, as if the artist felt the need to make sure that what he ultimately rejects has been used up to the full.
Styrofoam is a material that Łakomy uses to its utmost. Commonly found in the streets, the medium in his hands is becoming an extremely flexible material, full of potential. By eroding it, the artist highlights its richness; by lighting it up, he brings it to life.
Lasota further comments on the sculptor's practise:
Perhaps Piotr erects ruined monuments of botched work or impossible relations, but this havoc is a result of vehement processes. In this sense Łakomy’s work is drunken; this is first of all a result of some excess and second of all calls for a unique kind of perception. Suspending a gaze on a misty surface, highlighting obtrusive details and monotony, and playing with scale remind viewers of a state of raised temperature or other situations when – unable to fully control their own bodies – they have tried to find their bearings in reality or simply to find their way home.
Another opportunity to see Łakomy’s work in Peckham awaits at Bold Tendencies, a vibrant project that's greatly responsible for the district’s recent popularity. Bold Tendencies is a space open from June to September in a multi-storey car park crammed behind the Peckham multiplex, the top-floor bar offering spectacular views of the central London highrises. Along with screenings and workshops, one of the main activities for this initiative is a series of commissioned site-specifc sculptures – one of them being Łakomy’s A Room With a View, in the 2013 edition of the project.
Placed in an empty corner of the carpark, the piece reflects the artist’s interest in working with negative space within objects and architecture. As with his artworks at the Sunday Painter exhibition, this piece introduces mass-produced, mundane objects into the space – by exposing the absence of human figures in the area, the objects begin to speak to the simple human emotions, those of longing for someone’s arrival, and a call for action.
Piotr Łakomy (born 1983) is a graduate of the Institute of Fine Arts at the University of Zielona Góra. He works with painting, installation and objects. He has produced the following projects and publications: T-HOOD (Temporary Hood) (2011); DUST SHOW (activites in public spaces) in Copenhagen, September-October (2010); DUST SNOW (Winter Sculpture Park), Poznan, Poland, January (2010 ). Łakomy currently lives and works in Poznań. He is represented by Stereo Gallery.
Life Size Shadow
21st June - 21st July 2013
The Sunday Painter
1st Floor
12-16 Blenheim Grove
London, SE15 4QL
Friday-Sunday, 12-18 or by appointment
Bold Tendencies
30th June - 30th September 2013
Levels 7-10
Multi Storey Car Park
95a Rye Lane
Peckham
SE15 9ST
sources: Bold Tendencies, The Sunday Painter, ArtLicks, edited by Anna Micińska 15.07.2013