6 May – 11 June 2011
Design – BWA Gallery Wroclaw, 2 – 4 Swidnicka Street
Exhibition opening: 6 May, 7:00 pm




The title BE[A]ST, like the exhibition itself, stimulates a play of a double meaning. From one side, we are presenting a selection of the most successful (the 'best' in the title) works by Lukasz Paluch, from the other side– we are uncovering the aesthetic interests of the designer from Wrocław, including his special foible [*foible = weakness, tendency] – Italian gialli , B-class thriller movies. The exhibition shows both new works prepared for its purposes, as well as some former projects, which, however, are presented behind their original, informative or commercial, context. In his design, Paluch concentrates on the ideogram, which will be the main character of the presentation. A surprising stage design of the exhibition once again will test the 'graphic exhibition' format in the Design Gallery.

Curator: Katarzyna Roj
Production: Marta Kubik

Watch the exhibition documentary

design@bwa.wroc.pl
www.bwa.wroc.pl

IF YOU SAY A, YOU CANNOT SAY B.

Claudia Mareis in her book Altitude about graphic design in Switzerland recalls a history marked with the foregoing cryptogram. In 2003 the organisers of the Swiss Design Competition divided the participants into two groups. In group A there were designers specialising in so-called 'self-editions', unique series, projected and produced for their own purposes. In group B there were designers accomplishing commercial commissions. All the designers were deciding themselves in which group they would express themselves in the best way. That experiment was supposed to demonstrate the level of the artistic motivation of the participants, as well as – in a broader perspective – to refer to more and more popular debates on 'author issue' in design which has been taking place since at least a decade now.
The subject of the author dominated in the ‘60s of the twentieth century, originally in the form of an 'author policy' of French New Wave filmmakers, finally as 'the great absent' in the significant titles of the Roland Barthes’ texts (Death of the author) and Michael Foucault’s (What is an author?)
After a couple of decades it returns, this time amongst the circles of graphic designers. Poetic diagnoses, according to which it is exactly a flat design – typography and text organisation – which is the closest to that policy because of its natural intimacy with 'writing style' of the author – these diagnoses are very suggestive in their tone. Still, however, the touchstone of the 'authorship' of the project remains unknown. The division proposed by the organisers of the Swiss competition is deceiving after all. The author is the one who, despite the most difficult negotiations with the client, will stick to his style and make his own project, as Lukas Marti says, 'exactly in this way and no other.'


B FOR BEAST

Design Gallery – BWA Wroclaw has a pleasure of presenting BE[A]ST exhibition, the author of which is Lukasz Paluch. Its title, like the exhibition itself, stimulates a play of a double meaning. We are showing a selection of the most successful projects realised up to now ('the BEST of' in a title), which for the purposes of the exhibition were deprived of their original, often informative and commercial context. The set/stage design scenography  itself is important as well, as it creates the parenthesis for the favourite aesthetics of the author, who himself is perhaps hidden under an emblem of a wolf beast, the leitmotif of the exhibition. Abstracted figures, torn down posters, melting logotypes – the exhibition pieces compose an author’s book, a guide to favourite states and styles, revealing 'a writing style' of its designer.
Amongst that all we discover his special foible – Italian gialli, B-class thiller movies – here in an intimate installation by Anna Kolodziejczyk, held in a 'Black Case'.


Katarzyna Roj


* foible = weakness, tendency