ARTONS

The title of Smaga’s exhibition is taken from Włodzimierz Borowski’s legendary Artons (1958-1963)—"living" hybrid objects composed of various plastic parts, items or their fragments. Using photography, Smaga broke the Artons down into elementary particles, in order to reassemble them into a new, two-dimensional whole—a kind of visualization of the cosmos interwoven in the material of art.

Smaga describes his use of Borowski’s works as con­cep­tual documen­tation. “It is an examination of the material of art under rules similar to science,” he says, “sub­jec­ting it to observation close to a physics experiment. This is possible because of the con­fidence that works created in the field of art are just as real as presen­tations uncon­nec­ted with cul­ture and should be treated in the same way—seriously.”