Karol Hiller: The Alchemist from the Evil City Hashtag (topic) #interrupted country #photography & visual arts Nagłówek super artykułu Title on page in header Karol Hiller: The Alchemist from the Evil City Image or video karol_hiller_ms_sn_gr_306001.jpg Podpis dla multimediów 'Kompozycja heliograficzna (XL): Wisielec' (Heliographic Composition (XL): Hangman) by Karol Hiller, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Header text color rgb(255, 255, 255) Enable audio for video Off Negative header audio button Wyłączony Negative side audio button Wyłączony Zawartość (treść strony Super Artykułu) Tekst For years, Hiller has been important in Łódź’s avant-garde circles, as both an artist and an organiser –but greater successes have evaded him. For example, in 1932, he lost an artistic competition, organised by the city, to Władysław Strzemiński. Hiller lives modestly, earning some money through graphic design, as well as by working as a teacher. He also sells conventional still lives and landscapes that fit the interiors of bourgeois living rooms. The artist, writer, and critic Jerzy Hulewicz writes in Kurier Poranny (Morning Courier) about Hiller's Warsaw exhibition, full of enthusiasm: Text size standard fonts size Hiller has outpaced all of us in Poland in learning the new artistic truth – he has outpaced us in his capabilities as a painter. Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column Any exhibition at the IPS is an event in and of itself. This presentation site, more modern than any other in Poland, was created in 1930. Right column The Institute for Art Propaganda (IPS) in Warsaw, photo: NAC When in 1907, cubism signalled the upcoming World War I, art seemed to have been one step ahead of real life. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Tekst Amongst the works exhibited at the IPS are Hiller’s late paintings and heliographics, full of a sense of uncertainty and fear. They depict insignificant human figures battling against the vastness of space and the dispassionate forces of the elements. The exhibition closes on 25th January. That night, all of Europe, from Scandinavia to Italy and Greece, is able to witness a spectacular aurora in the sky. Dr Edward Stenz wrote in Urania, a journal devoted to astronomy, that ‘the blood-like colour of the aurora is believed to have instilled fear among the population’. Those more superstitious see it as an omen of impending war. Text size standard fonts size Tekst Mother Europe plays cards with Jehova over a torn map of the world Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column The first bombs fall on Łódź on 2nd September. A week later, German troops triumphantly enter the city, which is soon renamed Litzmannstadt. Right column 'Kompozycja Heliograficzna (XXVII)' (Heliographic Composition (XXVII)) by Karol Hiller, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Podpis obrazka Poznański Palace in Łódź, photo: NAC Tekst But Hiller is more than a member of a family of Polonised German industrialists. He is also an avant-garde artist with a social and socialist outlook. From a perspective similar to his, Łódź is not a promised land, even though it would remain his beloved city until the very end. After the Revolution of 1905, Ivan Timkowski-Kostin wrote in his book Miasto Proletariuszy (City of Proletarians) (1907) about the reign of the ‘anarchy of hunger’. The Polish writer Zygmunt Bartkiewicz is much more direct. His 1911 book Złe Miasto: Obrazy z 1907 Roku (The Evil City: Images from 1907) begins with the following paragraph: Text size standard fonts size There exists an evil city in Poland. And how hypocritical it is! Even though it is covered with mourning veils, it mocks death. It has mounted thousands of peaks as high as the heavens, but it is soaked in blood at its foundation. It gathers its unbending force from the delicate flowers of cotton and its life from dead gold. It is indebted to villainy. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Fullscreen gallery items Text Just before Poland is to regain its independence in 1918, Łódź is the most densely populated city in the country, but it also lacks a sewage system. The stratification of the newly reborn country is nowhere as visible as here: a city where the owners of large factories live in palaces full of gold surrounded by French gardens, while the workers are cramped in overpopulated and claustrophobic tenement houses devoid of any modern conveniences. Podpis obrazka Workers installing sewers at 107 Piotrkowska Street, Łódź, photo: NAC Text position left top Text Hiller lives with his wife and stepson in a flat located in the Józef Montwiłł-Mirecki neighbourhood, which was built at the end of the 1920s. This elegant district of small modernist blocks of flats is distinct among the surrounding depressing worker accommodations thanks not only to its design: the apartments are outfitted with electricity, running water and sewage disposal systems. Compared with those tenement houses, which seem suitable only for the proliferation of germs, the neighbourhood appears like something out of a dream. Podpis obrazka The Józef Montwiłło-Mirecki Estate in Łódź, photo: NAC Text position left top Text These luxuries were actually built with workers in mind, as they were the ones who were supposed to move in there. Unfortunately, such luxuries came at a price that was far too high for the Łódź proletariat. The district, located at Srebrzyńska Street, becomes an enclave for the city’s intelligentsia, including artists. Katarzyna Kobro and Właadysław Strzemiński created a home for themselves not far from Hiller. Podpis obrazka The Józef Montwiłło-Mirecki Estate in Łódź, photo: NAC Text position left top Tekst It is here, in this apartment, where Hiller finds himself summoned by the Gestapo on 7th November 1939. The artist’s friend, the poet Mieczysław Jastrun, tries to convince him to get as far as possible from Łódź. Hiller responds: ‘To change names as if I had changed bodies and to lead the life of a phantom? No, that is impossible for me.’ Refusing to run away and unwilling to sign the Volksliste (which would afford him recognition as an ethnic German), Hiller speaks to German soldiers only in Polish, even though his German is perfect. On 10th November, he responds to the summons and is put in what used to be Michał Glazer’s cloth mill in Radogoszcz. He is then, however, turned in to one of a few temporary prisons for the victims of the Intelligenzaktion. Hiller promptly writes a secret note to his wife: Text size standard fonts size Dear Jadzia, I am doing fine. I've ended up in Glazer’s mill in Radogoszcz. Please send food. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Tekst The artist’s mother, Marianna Hiller, exhibits a similar force of spirit and attempts to get her son out of prison, writing letters – even to the Führer himself – asking for Hiller’s release. However, she also refuses to sign the Volskliste, throwing a Gestapo officer attempting to convince her to do so out of her house. Hiller spends a month in his cell. On 6th December, the ad hoc court sentences him to death, and two weeks later, he is shot to death in Lućmierski Forest, near Łódź. A year later, the now twice-widowed Jadwiga (her first husband having died in the previous war, while fighting on the same front as Hiller) is evicted from the apartment at Srebrzyńska Street. She manages to save only some of her husband’s works. Text size standard fonts size Tekst The stone city, drunk on its labour, sleeps as heavily as a stone In this story, everything happens twice. Hiller’s work disappears twice as well. It happens for the first time in Kiev, where Hiller is unable to find peace as a student of the Academy of Fine Arts. During his stay in the city, the flags waving on the streets are changed almost every month. In November 1917, the Ukrainian People’s Republic is founded. Three months later, the city is captured by the Bolsheviks, only to be taken over by the Germans in March. In April, Ataman Pavlo Skoropadskyi assumes power, but half a year later, Bolshevik troops enter the city once again. The atmosphere in the artistic circles of Kiev is also heated, as many Polish artists and echoes of the experiments of the radical Soviet avant-garde reach the city. Hiller keeps his distance from both. Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column At the time, the would-be chemist and future leading avant-garde artist of the Second Republic of Poland is more interested in studying the secrets of icon painting – specifically by the Ukrainian neo-byzantine artist Mykhailo Boychuk, a representative Right column 'Anioł' (Angel) by Karol Hiller, tempera on paper, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Columns style left column static Left column Following his return to Łódź, images from the city quickly barge into Hiller’s paintings, but Boychuk’s lessons are not put aside. Right column 'Tkacz' (The Weaver) by Karol Hiller, tempera on board, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź It is necessary to understand and to feel, which means to love […] the communal spirit of the city in order to see the beauty of its material expressions. […] The Łódź-born Pietkiewicz once left for Italy to paint the Doge’s Palace and the Piazza San Marco in Venice. And how did it turn out? The sweet pastel-paintings, merely correct […] do not possess the charm of the paintings created by the Venice-enamoured Canaletto. Pietkiewicz’s Venice is a painted corpse or a panopticon mannequin. An interest in the exotic cannot be a substitute for deep love. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Columns style right column static Left column 'Zagłębie' (The Basin) by Karol Hiller, tempera na board, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Right column The byzantine landscape full of mounting rocks and ridges, only slightly covered with plants, thus disappears in the ‘maw of a cotton monster’ – taken as if out of Wandurski’s poetry collections. Tekst Even though Hiller was associated with constructivism, he never really considered himself part of the movement. Two abstract paintings from 1928 that were deemed groundbreaking – Deska 0 (Board 0) and Deska ze Spiral (Board with a Spiral) – are as close to constructivism as to the aesthetic of the American precisionists. There is also no denying the subtle remainders of the inspirations from the neo-byzantine period in Hiller’s work, which ended a few years before: the form and the material foundation of the paintings (stressed in the titles) are icon-like, and the geometric figures are in places accompanied by gold leaves. The synthesised industrial landscape contains all of the emotional shades of the previous Łódź paintings. In Deska 0, the tiny fragment of the urban landscape is surrounded by semi-abstract machinery, lit by a supernatural light. At the same time, the gold is full of transcendence. Pumped by the factory pistons into the city’s bloodstream, it turns into a purely material substance – a ‘filthy gold’ taken out of Bartkiewicz’s book. Text size standard fonts size Podpis obrazka 'Robotnicy' (Workers) by Karol Hiller, oil on cardboard, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Tekst In an autumn coat, I walk city’s depths, as if in a diving suit of armour Soulless rationalism is at the time opposed by surrealism, with its love of archaisms, magic and alchemy. It attempts to criticise the capitalist logic from within by exaggerating its elements in a vivid manner and compulsively overstating them. In the eyes of surrealists, modern mechanisation creates not a new type of human beings, but vague human-machine hybrids. This all resonates perfectly with Hiller’s interests and worldview. In Nowe Widzenie, he writes: Text size standard fonts size […] the state of today’s visual arts should express itself in the intensification of the dynamic mass of forms, since in light of the great potential of the general sense of lack, there can be no place for the distinguished delights of a connoisseur enjoying the already-established values. These theoretical foundations agree completely with the actual state of things in surrealism, which brings back not only the increased effect of the forms of modern art, but also a specific subject for the paintings. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Podpis obrazka 'Deska 0 (Kompozycja 0)' (Desk 0 (Composition 0)) by Karol Hiller, oil, gold leaf on plywood, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Tekst In the 1930s, during the development of a new, monumental neoclassicism often tied to nationalist themes (as in Nazi Germany and Sarmatian Poland), Hiller comes to admire surrealist internationalism. This proves extremely natural for his art, which blends elements from different cultural circles: Text size standard fonts size […] the emergence of universalistic principles can today become a stable connection between the art of different nations. They enable a direct contact between the art and the audience on the way to a common, innate knowledge about the most fundamental of things. The fulfilment of this truth is one of the greatest achievements of surrealism. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Podpis obrazka 'Kompozycja Heliograficzna (XLV)' (Heliographic Composition (XLV)) by Karol Hiller, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Tekst However, the artist’s view is not widely shared. In Łódź, only the poet Jan Brzękowski approaches the surrealist movement with similar enthusiasm. Władysław Strzemiński, whose name has already become synonymous with Łódź’s avant-garde, sees surrealism not as a sign of progress, but as an obscurantist attack on modern ideals: Text size standard fonts size In surrealism, the elements of the painting’s form are arranged in a diffused blur of subconscious association and in a biological movement of a senseless game of random forces. They foreshadow an era where social reactions of the lower kind, born in the hypothalamus and the brainstem, will rule the world. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column While Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Hungary and Romania all boast surrealist groups that enjoy the blessing of André Breton, known as ‘the pope of surrealism’, flashes of the movement in Interwar Poland are faint and short-lived. Right column 'Kompozycja heliograficzna (XXXV)' (Heliographic Composition (XXXV)) by Karol Hiller, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź We are abolishing the expression of personal moods and the mannerism of exposing one’s feelings that has been so far present in modern art. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Tekst Hiller, however, has nothing against exposing his feelings, and contrary to Kantor, he does not feel any contradictions between surrealism and the religious inspirations of his art. He is a Marxist longing for transcendence, drawn towards the representatives of the Interwar ‘evangelical Marxism’. One of them is Anatol Stern, who writes in an introduction to his 1927 collection of poems Bieg do Bieguna (A Run to the North Pole) that ‘Marx’s philosophy is not contradictory to religious sentiments’; to the contrary, ‘they complement each other, and the struggle for the people’s happiness would not have a solid foundation without them’. In the poem Mój Bóg (My God), Stern unites Christianity with Marxism in a suggestive image: Text size standard fonts size take a good look: a red Trotsky and a purple pope hold each other’s hands, two halves of a single globe. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column The Milky Way, electric currents, an ocean of ether Hiller’s key achievement turns out to be his own technique, which he has been developing since 1928 – heliographics. Today, it is above all considered a major contribution to photography. Right column 'Kompozycja heliograficzna (XXXIX). Romantycy' (Heliographic Composition (XXXIX): The Romantics) by Karol Hiller, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Right now, having completely mastered the medium in order to limit the random effects to the greatest extent possible, I have created a series of graphic images in which the element of creative consciousness occupies the same role as in other known techniques of reproductive graphic design. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Tekst Hiller has created an uncommonly flexible technique, one that will remain unmatched in its capacity to create various and easily adjustable effects until the development of computers and graphic design software. On the basis of uncontrollable photograms, Hiller the alchemist conjures a technique completely subservient to the artist’s will. He writes of heliographics: Text size standard fonts size Everything depends on the creativity, and the ease of expressing this creativity makes it a technique least of all dependent on the characteristics of material factors – because everything that is not in line with the artist’s intention can be easily erased with just a single swipe of a cloth or finger. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column He applies paint to film using brushes, fingers and pieces of cotton. He scratches and smudges. He experiments with chemical substances, magnetism and even electricity. Right column Cover of the French publication 'Introduction to Cosmonautics' by Ary Sternfeld, designed by Karol Hiller Fullscreen gallery items Text A year before the outbreak of the war and the death of the artist, the harmonious and elegant compositions begin to get invaded by aggressive and catastrophic elements. The frames of Kompozycja Heliograficzna XXVII (Heliographic Composition no. 27) seem as if they are about to burst under the pressure coming from the whirl of ominous black shapes emerging from the sea depths like tendrils. Podpis obrazka 'Kompozycja Heliograficzna (XXVI)' (Heliographic Composition (XXVI)) by Karol Hiller, alongside its printing plate, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Text position center top Text Kompozycja Heliograficzna XXVI (Heliographic Composition no. 26) depicts holes in brick gates from which dark streams of sewage flow to an underground tank. Kompozycja Heliograficzna XXXIV (Heliographic Composition no. 34) shows similar spurts coming out of the mouths of chopped-down people-mannequins. They are devoid of limbs and faces, but on their heads, we can see the characteristic hairstyles similar to that of the leader of the Third Reich. Podpis obrazka 'Kompozycja Heliograficzna (XXXIV)' (Heliographic Composition (XXXIV)) by Karol Hiller, alongside its printing plate, photo: Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź Text position center middle Tekst The star falls into me like green seeds Even though Hiller was eager to share the secrets to his craft, heliographics gained little popularity among Polish artists. Only Aniela Menkesowa, another artist from Łódź, attempted to follow Hiller’s lead, but she died in Lviv two years after Hiller – shot to death, together with her entire family. Text size standard fonts size Columns style left column static Left column After the war, Hiller’s work inspired the early (and surrealist in nature) photographs of Zbigniew Dłubak. Right column 'Budzę się Nagle w Nocy Myśląc o Dalekim Południu' (I Wake Suddenly in the Night Thinking of the Far South) by Zbigniew Dłubak, photogram, photo: National Museum in Warsaw They did not resemble anything and could have been associated with anything. Completely abstract, indescribably and forcefully alive, biological, being born and dying the most real of deaths. Breathlessly dramatic. Signature Trans. MW Text size standard fonts size Tekst Hiller found his admirers and worthy successors on the boundary between art and cinema: after Pawłowski, he inspired the members of the Film Form Studio – most notably Józef Robakowski, once again contributing to a harmony between previously distinct media. Originally written in Polish by Piotr Policht, Jul 2019; translated by Michał Wieczorek, Aug 2019. The subheadings are translated from poems by Witold Wandurski published in ‘Sadze i Złoto’. Text size standard fonts size Introduction Warsaw, 5th January 1938. The Institute for Art Propaganda (IPS) in Warsaw has just opened an exhibition of work by the Łódź-based artist Karol Hiller – the largest of his career. Having come from a neo-byzantine tradition, he doesn't fit in with the constructivists who made their debut a little earlier, leaving him somewhat on the sidelines. But the time for full recognition has finally arrived. Not standard color version Off Series label Poland 1939: Interrupted Country Summary Warsaw, 5th January 1938. The Institute for Art Propaganda (IPS) in Warsaw has just opened an exhibition of work by the Łódź-based artist Karol Hiller – the largest of his career. Having come from a neo-byzantine tradition, he doesn't fit in with the constructivists who made their debut a little earlier, leaving him somewhat on the sidelines. But the time for full recognition has finally arrived. Cover Thumbnail size default [360 px] Thumbnail karol_hiller_ms_sn_gr_141001.jpg
