Granary Island 1985–1995

Granary Island 1985–1995
Granary Island Granary Island is a place (extraterritorial) that evokes a special sense of historical space, of what once was and yet is still present, acting as cultural fertiliser – fermenting deposits. Working on the ‘Island’, I drew on the awareness of the many layers beneath my feet: rubble, earth, burnt grain, charred floors, etc. I constantly encountered lost fragments, restored layers, which influence the present shape of the projects being created in this place. Constituting media in the face of a place, invoking them, which is also a form of reading. A retrospective of the negative into the positive, the development of the degraded, which never lost its inspiring content. Imprints of fundamental laws of culture, subjectivised at the intersection of existence and artefact, and this in a dual perspective – from the micro-area of the body into flesh, to the macro-area of constructing the ‘shadows’ of monumental buildings. Interpersonal contacts and artist-artist relationships, a kind of communal activity, transforming into autonomous nests, placing us at the level of the noise of individuality (individual significance). In a purified space, there is a silencing, a whitening (white as a kind of emptiness) according to Beckett's model, which takes place, happens, is now. The evoked space, the place – Wyspa Spichrzów (Granary Island) – is only a model, a shortcut to broader, more general searches for another space, another land, a mythical land of artistic fulfilment, which is nevertheless perversely close, as it lies underfoot as the only one possible to fulfil here and now. Grzegorz Klaman, Wyspa [Island], in: Seminarium Projekt Wyspa. Natura – Kultura – Wyspa –Woda – Teraźniejszość – Przyszłość [Seminar Island Project. Nature – Culture – Island – Water – Presence – Future], Galeria Wyspa, Gdańsk 1993, p. 3.
An island is a place (extraterritorial) that evokes a special sense of historical space, of what once was and yet still exists, acting as cultural fertiliser – fermenting sediments. While working on ‘The Island’, I drew on the awareness of the many layers beneath my feet: rubble, earth, burnt grain, charred floors, etc. I constantly encountered lost fragments, restored layers that influence the current shape of the projects created in this place. Creating media in the face of a place, evoking them, which is also a form of reading. Retrospection of the negative in the positive, the development of the degraded, which has never lost its inspiring content. Imprints of fundamental laws of culture, subjectivised at the intersection of existence and artefact, and this in a double perspective – from the micro-area of the body to the body, to the macro-area of constructing the ‘shadows’ of monumental buildings. Interpersonal contacts and artist-artist relationships, a kind of joint action, transforming into autonomous nests, placing us at the level of the noise of individuality (individual meaning). In a purified space, there is a silencing, a whitening (white as a kind of emptiness) according to Beckett's model, which takes place, happens, is now. The evoked space, the place – Wyspa Spichrzów (Granary Island) – is only a model, a shortcut to broader, more general searches for another space, another land, a mythical land of artistic fulfilment, which is, however, perversely close, because it lies underfoot as the only one possible to fulfil here and now. Grzegorz Klaman, Wyspa [Island], in: Seminarium Projekt Wyspa. Natura – Kultura – Wyspa – Woda – Teraźniejszość – Przyszłość [Seminar Project Island. Nature – Culture – Island – Water – Present – Future], Galeria Wyspa, Gdańsk 1993, p. 3.