Bogdan Konopka
“China – The Empire of Greyness“
08 09 2008 – 24 09 2008
Gallery „Arka“
Partner: French Culture Centre
Bogdan Konopka’s photography may be considered to be the evidence of various foreseeable and unforeseeable meetings, both obvious and surprising, whose content and sense is not always realized by the photographer. Sometimes it is only intuition that lets him discover something he notices only when he develops a print some time later, looks at it and “reads” it in a different place, at a different time and from a different, twodimensional point of view. I think that such adventures often come the Author’s way and they motivate him and his activities, making him, in turn, explore and discover. This last series of works proves that there are no geographic or cultural barriers to those activities. The only obstacle may be that more often than not we look, but do not see. Bogdan Konopka is someone who – looking and seeing – is able to contain what he sees in the image, reminding us of that state when we sometimes look and see something exceptional. In such cases we experience a rare and unusual feeling of intense presence in the surrounding world. It is accompanied by the feeling of sensual and mental link with the world. This is precisely the moment when we hold our breath in order not to disturb the intense feeling of being at one with the world. In everyday life such moments happen very rarely. The photographs by Bogdan Konopka let us not only remember those feelings, but breed them, if we can. Looking at those works we can only guess at the intense and intimate contact with the world, common for all of us, and with those moments in time that the Author shares with us so generously. His most recent photographs prove that they may be experienced everywhere, round the corner of one’s street or in other, remote places, like Paris, Lódz or Bejing.
Text © Lech Lechowicz
