Zbiok Czajkowski
Visual artist, painter, illustrator, graffiti artist . The artist main medium are painting and street inspired illustration. In his artistic practice, he uses an airbrush to create hyper-realistic paintings, which the artist describes as realistic surrealism. Zbiok paints non-portraits which he himself refers to as Scalps. These are found, processed visual samples from which the artist creates image-masks, which he then metaphorically dresses up. The mask worn in this way allows the artist to speak directly about his fantasies, needs and emotions. It allows him to express his own self in an uninhibited way, without reference to his own physicality.
Central to Czajkowski `work is aesthetics. The artist deliberately uses the airbrush in his paintings, a technique he has extracted from his many years of practice painting graffiti. The use of the airbrush allows the artist to achieve a language that emulates images viewed on phone, tablet and computer screens. The artist makes use of the ubiquitous visual flood as well as AI technology, in which Tchaikovsky looks for errors, distortions. Zbiok's premeditated protuberance of digital errors, blurry, fuzzy images, distortions, glitches, random mistakes create a distinctive language of expression reflecting the visual fetishism of the Screen Generation.
The artist's work is inspired by the attitudes and expressions of the people who made up the subcultures of the early 1980s. He is fascinated by the courage and anti-systemism of the punk`s, goths, new romantics, The Blitz Kids, Leigh Bowery and the New York Club Kids of the time.
Thougts about my paintings
I have named my latest painting series Scalps. I paint them with an airbrush, a technique derived from my long practice as a painter rooted in graffiti. The subjects of my paintings are human images. One might get the impression that I paint portraits but this is not entirely true. What interests me in them are the shells, the effigy. I process them and create masks from it. Or to put it literally, I pull off their scalps which I then dress up myself. What does this mean? My latest paintings, although they are maintained in a photorealistic manner, but its not a praise for the proud owners of the faces I have found. The portraits I paint are masks behind which I, the artist, hide. I literally canibalize the found images. In order to be able to express my own emotions, needs, desires and beliefs, I need a mask behind which I can hide, free of conventions and social norms. I am not interested in beauty.
I am interested in being weird, in improper, in expressing myself. Being a weirdo as an emanation of my own personality. By putting on the mask, I gain the courage to talk about my emotions without restraint. The most important inspiration for my work are the attitudes and expressions of the people who made up the subcultures of the early 1980s. I am fascinated by the courage and anti-establishment of the punks, goths, new romantics, The Blitz Kids, Leigh Bowery and the New York Club Kids of the time. My latest paintings are created by processing found photographs . On their basis, I prepare my effigy masks. I do it because it gives me the possibility to control the way other people perceive us. Other people will see the mask, what is underneath will remain hidden. By putting on a mask, we can paradoxically be our truest selves.
The found images that I use in my paintings I refer to them as materials. Those samples should first and foremost belong to the background collection. What does this mean? For me, belonging to the background set means: coincidence. Faces found in this way are not posed. Those images are not studied, they have been caught by chance without any intention of being in the foreground, literally and figuratively. In my artistic practice, I look for secondary and tertiary faces, people from the background, from the distant plan. For the same reason I like to use AI-generated images. I am fascinated by the imperfection of computer-generated faces, I look for mistakes and strange modifications in them. The images I am looking for have to be symbolically sanitized, sterilized of extraneous emotions, in order to serve as material for a mask that I could wear in public.I pull the symbolic scalp of their face. Then after modifications I put it on. It gives me the courage to talk about myself. This is how I explain to myself the world around me.
Contact:
Zbiok Czajkowski
zbiok.net@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/zbiok/
Zbiok Czajkowski
Visual artist, painter, illustrator, graffiti artist . The artist main medium are painting and street inspired illustration. In his artistic practice, he uses an airbrush to create hyper-realistic paintings, which the artist describes as realistic surrealism. Zbiok paints non-portraits which he himself refers to as Scalps. These are found, processed visual samples from which the artist creates image-masks, which he then metaphorically dresses up. The mask worn in this way allows the artist to speak directly about his fantasies, needs and emotions. It allows him to express his own self in an uninhibited way, without reference to his own physicality.
Central to Czajkowski `work is aesthetics. The artist deliberately uses the airbrush in his paintings, a technique he has extracted from his many years of practice painting graffiti. The use of the airbrush allows the artist to achieve a language that emulates images viewed on phone, tablet and computer screens. The artist makes use of the ubiquitous visual flood as well as AI technology, in which Tchaikovsky looks for errors, distortions. Zbiok's premeditated protuberance of digital errors, blurry, fuzzy images, distortions, glitches, random mistakes create a distinctive language of expression reflecting the visual fetishism of the Screen Generation.
The artist's work is inspired by the attitudes and expressions of the people who made up the subcultures of the early 1980s. He is fascinated by the courage and anti-systemism of the punk`s, goths, new romantics, The Blitz Kids, Leigh Bowery and the New York Club Kids of the time.
Thougts about my paintings
I have named my latest painting series Scalps. I paint them with an airbrush, a technique derived from my long practice as a painter rooted in graffiti. The subjects of my paintings are human images. One might get the impression that I paint portraits but this is not entirely true. What interests me in them are the shells, the effigy. I process them and create masks from it. Or to put it literally, I pull off their scalps which I then dress up myself. What does this mean? My latest paintings, although they are maintained in a photorealistic manner, but its not a praise for the proud owners of the faces I have found. The portraits I paint are masks behind which I, the artist, hide. I literally canibalize the found images. In order to be able to express my own emotions, needs, desires and beliefs, I need a mask behind which I can hide, free of conventions and social norms. I am not interested in beauty.
I am interested in being weird, in improper, in expressing myself. Being a weirdo as an emanation of my own personality. By putting on the mask, I gain the courage to talk about my emotions without restraint. The most important inspiration for my work are the attitudes and expressions of the people who made up the subcultures of the early 1980s. I am fascinated by the courage and anti-establishment of the punks, goths, new romantics, The Blitz Kids, Leigh Bowery and the New York Club Kids of the time. My latest paintings are created by processing found photographs . On their basis, I prepare my effigy masks. I do it because it gives me the possibility to control the way other people perceive us. Other people will see the mask, what is underneath will remain hidden. By putting on a mask, we can paradoxically be our truest selves.
The found images that I use in my paintings I refer to them as materials. Those samples should first and foremost belong to the background collection. What does this mean? For me, belonging to the background set means: coincidence. Faces found in this way are not posed. Those images are not studied, they have been caught by chance without any intention of being in the foreground, literally and figuratively. In my artistic practice, I look for secondary and tertiary faces, people from the background, from the distant plan. For the same reason I like to use AI-generated images. I am fascinated by the imperfection of computer-generated faces, I look for mistakes and strange modifications in them. The images I am looking for have to be symbolically sanitized, sterilized of extraneous emotions, in order to serve as material for a mask that I could wear in public.I pull the symbolic scalp of their face. Then after modifications I put it on. It gives me the courage to talk about myself. This is how I explain to myself the world around me.
Contact:
Zbiok Czajkowski
zbiok.net@gmail.com
https://www.instagram.com/zbiok/