About the Crucified.
So simple! - therefore surprises, seduces and convinces you of the way to see the subject. It teaches to look with the eye of photography - explains the expression of sculpture.
The idea of a photographic creation from a single Subject such as the Crucified deserves so much applause.
Tomasz Sobecki didn't photograph his subject in a flash - he wonderfully proved how to photograph sculpture by giving us a poignant
A lesson in the anatomy of pain.
Wladyslaw Hasior, 1983
Recommendations that my Master and Friend Wladyslaw Hasior made on the occasion of exhibitions planned in the UK, in particular at Coventry Cathedral, where he himself had previously presented his banners.
CRUCIFIX - INSPIRATIONS
The series of photograms KRUCYFIKS was created out of fascination with the beautiful late Gothic sculpture of Christ Crucified located in the WNMP church in Torun. The author of the sculpture is unknown.
The Resurrection, which leads through the cross, is the centerpiece of Christendom. The history of the visual presentation of the Crucifixion has a centuries-old tradition. Authors depicting this scene, for hundreds of years, have resorted to painterly or sculptural means of expression to build a message about the drama of Golgotha. The photographer has his own set of means of expression, available and still being developed only for 150 years, i.e. since the invention of photography.
The 1970s were a period of intense religious experience for me, deepened by theological reading. The crucifix, from the Church of the Holy Virgin Mary, was a mysterious image of Christ that inspired me to think from childhood and intensely affected me emotionally into adulthood.
Photographing this particular crucifix became the beginning of my art of photography understood as formulating my own thoughts with a camera and sharing this message with other people.
The photographic imagination was stimulated by the sparse illumination of the crucifix with only one light bulb. This ascetic light added a unique expression to the sculpture. I analyzed the suffering of Christ expressed in the crucifix by getting closer and closer with my camera lens to the details. I was particularly impressed by the suggestively shaded chest of the crucifix and the close-ups of the hands and feet pierced by nails. The tight, dynamic framing of these fragments of the " body " and the large close-ups with sharp shadows allowed me to give aesthetically new - photographic value to the Crucifixion.
The drama of Golgotha, which happened two thousand years ago, materialized by an unknown artist in a crucifix 1,500 years later, became the starting point for a new form of expression of the event, voiced by another artist at the end of the 20th century. The photographer's work would have been impossible without the earlier work of the sculptor - the crucifix - a material point of reference for the art of photography by half a millennium. For the photographer himself does not create an image starting from a white plane, as the painter does, but bases his process of formulating thoughts on photographing materially existing reality.
The crucifix in the WNMP church is a constant reference for my religious experiences and artistic fascinations - a recurring point for building a personal photographic account of the Crucifixion. Awareness of the centuries since Golgotha and the time in which the sculptor made his work is for me an intimate experience stretched in my imagination over many hundreds of years - participating in a religious and artistic event at the same time. It builds a spiritual connection with an unknown artist.
Tight frames analyzing the pain contained in every part of Christ's body intensify the photographic story of the Crucifixion. Framing that cuts off the upper space of "heaven" gives the impression of the uncertainty of tomorrow - the way to the Father in heaven is symbolically cut off in this way, closed by the mystery of death. The dark transverse beam of the cross, deprived of any vertical accent by deliberate cropping, points to the drama of all those who have not yet experienced or believed in the Resurrection.
Also important are the gestures of the Crucified One, extracted by two-dimensional photography from the three-dimensional space of the sculpture and its surroundings. Christ's hands, dynamically stretched upward, aim toward heaven. Unique in the iconography of the Crucifixion, the gaze of the lens from above suggests, together with the staging of the candles, the adoration of the drama of Golgotha by the people. It can also be understood as the dying Christ's blessing of those who will remain on earth alone, without the Man-God, in uncertainty about His essence until the Resurrection.
Of particular importance in this series is the face of the crucifix. The dynamic chiaroscuro caused by the crown of thorns gives it strong drama and expression, emphasizes the pain of the dying while maintaining its dignity and beauty. With all the drama of the situation, the face of this crucifix carries the unique gentleness of Christ's expression.
While photographing the crucifix between 1981 and 1983, I experienced a particular self-discipline and even fear both of the subject and of the sculptor's achievements, which became the starting point for my work. I became more and more familiar, gazing through the lenses of my camera, with the anatomy and expression of the crucifix hanging near the entrance to the sacristy of the WNMP church in Toruń. I tried to penetrate the genius of the unknown sculptor who created the sculpture. Thanks to his artistry and spirituality, I was able to experience and reread, with the help of the photographer's workshop, the drama of the Crucifixion and formulate my message about the central point of a Christian's existence. However, I did not dare to change or transform with the photographic lens what the sculptor had created - I was paralyzed by the greatness of the subject and the responsibility for the result of my actions, for which the reference point was the centuries-old tradition and the poignant achievements of my precursor - the author of the crucifix.
The shot of Christ's feet was the only one I photographed in the early 1990s, with a temporal, emotional and religious distance from the basic shape of the KRUCYFIKS series - shaped ten years earlier. The impulse for new activities, concerning this theme, was the art exhibition of artists associated with Toruń - TUMULT in 1989. At that time, one of the photographs of the KRUCYFIKS series was realized in large format and crowned the beautiful Gothic exhibition hall on the first floor of the Old Town Hall. The new photography of the feet of the Crucified was also influenced by the works of Magritte as well as Hasior. At that time I already had first-class photographic equipment and, among other reasons, this photograph was realized in 2008 in a large, two-meter format.
From the beginning, i.e., as early as 1983, the exhibition KRUCYFIKS was outlined in the imagination as a set of photographs in a large format - corresponding to the natural dimensions of a human being. The series was invited, as another of my presentations, to Coventry Cathedral. After many attempts, realizing the concept of large-size photographs, during the communist era, proved impossible - both for organizational and financial reasons.
In 2008, I decided to develop the archival negatives by computer, as I was not able to completely abandon the thought of realizing the exhibition. Thanks to the support of the pastor of the Church of the Holy Virgin Mary, however, three large-format photograms were created and exhibited in this very church for almost a year. The exhibition of works from the CRUCIFIX series in the church where the medieval crucifix came from gave visitors a chance to compare, in the same place and time, the work of a sculptor from the 15th century with that of a photographer at the turn of the millennium.
Time will tell whether financial conditions will allow the realization of all large-format photograms of the KRUCYFIKS series, and whether there will be further exhibitions in Poland and abroad, to which the series is invited.
In spite of all the imperfections of the workshop, the form and the difficulties of implementation, this series was very important for me in my journey towards art and also in understanding the essence of Christianity.
Tomasz Sobecki / 1983 - 2009
Dr Tomasz Sobecki - Born and living in Toruń.
A graduate of the Fourth High School and Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun.
In the first period of his adult life he was engaged in natural sciences and mountaineering (Tatras, French Alps, Hindu Kush).
Parallel to his studies in natural sciences, he systematically participated in the alternative education of the Academic Chaplaincy of the Jesuit Fathers in Toruń - especially the Philosophy Group under the direction of Father Wladyslaw Woloszyn. He participated in lectures and discussions of distinguished Polish intellectuals, including Jozef Tischner, Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Jan Andrzej Kloczowski, Michal Heller, which had the status of a "flying university" - an opposition movement of intellectuals during the communist era.
The master who introduced him to the world of art and at the same time mentored his first foreign photographic exhibitions was Wladyslaw Hasior. His contacts with prominent Polish artists including Tadeusz Brzozowski, Jacek Sienicki, Stanislaw Rodziński and their art also influenced the formation of his artistic attitude.
He has received numerous Polish and foreign art scholarships, including those from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Spain (1990), the Ministry of Culture and Art of the Republic of Poland (1991 - 1993), the Fund for the Support of Creativity at ZAiKS, the Marshal of the Kujawsko-Pomorskie Voivodship and the Mayor of the City of Toruń.
He treats photography as one of the fields of visual arts with specific formal qualities. The characteristic way of creative work is the analysis of selected subjects until the cognitive potential and formal means are exhausted.
In June 2013, having defended his thesis IDEA PIRAMID, he received a doctorate in photography from the Cinematography Department of the Lodz Film School - PWSFTViT.
He has realized many exhibitions in prestigious Polish and foreign art and photography galleries, as well as in unusual public spaces, such as the Metropolitan Cathedral in Liverpool (1983) - a Catholic cathedral, or the famous Coventry Cathedral (1983) - an Anglican cathedral, the university library of St. Louis University - USA (1991), the Tsar's Railway Station in Aleksandrów Kujawski (2006), the Monesterio de Pedralbes - a Gothic monastery and part of a museum (MUHBA) in Barcelona (2010), the main Bayer Square of the Kazakh capital Astana (2011), O'Hare International Airport in Chicago (2013), an open-air exhibition in Sydney (2014), the college auditorium of the Indian Institute of Technology in Hiderabad (2015), the Great Synagogue in Tykocin (2023) and others.
He represented (as one of five artists) Poland with his SHAPE OF LIGHT series at the invitation of the Ministry of Culture and Arts of the Republic of Poland at the Caracas International Art Festival (1991).
Since 1986, he has participated in Polish and international symposia of photographers, e.g. PHOTOGRAPHERS OF OWN WAYS, ARS BALTICA (Poznan 1977), as well as designers - MEDIATECA (Brasov 1999). He participates in academic scientific conferences, e.g. PHILOSOPHY - ART VIII Festival of Philosophy (Olsztyn 2015), conference BEAUTY IN SACRUM (Bialystok 2016), TRANSPARENCY IN CULTURE (Warsaw 2019), PHOTOGRAPHY IN ART - ART IN PHOTOGRAPHY (Kielce 2023).
He has taught photography classes for cultural scientists and journalists at various universities: Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun, University of Lodz - also in English, Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz, as well as for the students of the Bydgoszcz Academy of Photography, and classes in artistic photography at the Faculty of Graphics of the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdansk. In 2015, he was invited as a visiting professor by the Indian Institute of Technology in Hyderabad, India, where he taught at the Department of Design.
The author's works can be found in museum collections: Museum of Art in Lodz, District Museum in Torun, Gallery of Contemporary Sacred Art in Kielce, Nadwislańskie Museum in Kazimierz-on-Vistula and in private collections in Poland and abroad.