In Conversation with Stanisław Koguciuk and Jan Uścimiak

Jan Janiak: Will the exhibition at Atlas Sztuki be your first exhibition together?

Jan Uścimiak: No. We have already had an exhibition together in Lublin. In 2004, I think. We often have them here in Chełm. Oh, here is one of the two of us. Here (at the Wiktor Ambroziewicz Chełm Land Museum in Chełm), in the foyer, there was one recently.

Stanisław Koguciuk: Here in the foyer in the summer, yes.

J.U.: And besides, we usually enter competitions together and attend fairs too. 

J.J.: Which competitions have you both entered?

J.U.: In Chełm, Lublin and Krasnystaw.

J.J.: How did you meet?

J.U.: Through those very events. But how long has it been? We have known each other for twenty years, perhaps longer.

S.K.: Yes, when you often appear together, you get to know one another quickly.

J.J.: And do you meet outside competitions?

J.U.: Oh, not really; you live a long way away. How far from here?

S.K.: Eighteen kilometres from Chełm, in Pławanice.

J.U.: And I am local.

J.J.: Please tell me how and when your adventure with art began. 

S.K.: Fifty years ago I first painted on two sleeves cut from a shirt. I did not prime them because I did not know I had to. And I painted two humorous pictures. My wife later sent me to trade at the village market. And I thought I would take those pictures to sell. She said: Take them, but if you see anyone you know, hide them so that people do not laugh at you, such a painter. Well…

J.J.: And did you manage to sell your first works?

S.K.: I sold all the farm produce, but no one looked at the pictures. But I thought: I am not taking them home; if no one buys them, I shall throw them into the rubbish. Then a tiny little girl was walking around the market; she stopped and I said: Well, little girl, are these pictures nice? Yes, they are nice. And would you like them? I would, but I have no money. Well, I will give them to you for free; say that, well, the man was in a hurry and gave you the pictures. And I tied the pictures together and gave them to the girl. Just like that, as a present.

J.J.: And what did your wife say when she saw the shirt without its sleeves?

S.K.: When my wife started doing the washing, she said: Where are the sleeves? And I said: What else would I paint the pictures on? I thought you were wiser than that, and you have ruined a good shirt. But when I sold the farm produce and came back, my wife said: Did you sell the pictures? I did! Did you get much? Not much, because it was my first painting. Later I bought paints and canvas, and had my first exhibition here in this museum. But I do not remember when.

J.J.: How did you suddenly start painting at the age of forty? Where did the impulse come from?

S.K.: Well, I liked painting, painting had always interested me, and somehow it began…

J.J.: And you, Mr Jan, do you remember your first sculptures?

J.U.: I began a very long time ago, when I was still a child. I was already carving then, because my grandfather and great-grandfather carved too, although I remember little of it now. My great-grandfather left behind a processional image, a little violin he left in the attic, and there were angels too. When I was young, I used to go up there and whittle away at those angels; it was a wooden cottage with a large attic. And once my uncle said: Where have the angels beside that processional image gone? And I said that I had taken them and, well, carved them all away. So he said to me: Now make new ones. And I made some, and they put them in, and from that moment it began, more and more. Later I was in the army in Piła, during my first year. I was there four years and three months altogether and belonged to an art club; there were highlanders there too. I remember their names to this day. I even still meet one of them; he is in Lublin now. And it has continued since then. When I returned after four years, I exhibited in Toruń. I did not win a prize, but Cepelia made contact. That was in 1976.

J.J.: Do you still have those first works? 

J.U.: The first works were even earlier, at home. I come from 120 kilometres away, from Biała Podlaska, around there, and there is still one at home from my childhood. I do not know what it is – perhaps Sienkiewicz, oh dear – carved in willow, I think.

J.J.: You said that Cepelia contacted you. Did they buy sculptures from you?

J.U.: Yes, they bought them for two years.

J.J.: You mentioned your great-grandfather and grandfather. Did your father also work in wood?

J.U.: No. My mother painted a little – wall hangings and such – and they wove. Because I come from a village where weaving was practised.

J.J.: Please tell me what attitude your families and neighbours had towards your work.

J.U.: In my case, Albiczuk lived in the next village – I do not know whether you have heard of him – and Kożuchowski too. Famous folk painters, so people did not really call me a fool, although one of them they did; he was an odd sort. I earned money from it straight away and had no unpleasantness. Occasionally someone said something to me, but I paid no attention.

S.K.: In my case, people in the village began to take an interest because they asked for my pictures for harvest festivals. Later I also obtained the professional qualifications of a visual artist, conferred by the Ministry of Culture and Art. I read that you could have an exhibition with them at an older age, so I applied. They said: You can send works to Warsaw, but you need to have had three solo exhibitions. I had my first here at the museum, later at the local Empik and at the Cement Works, and I sent in the papers. And they invited me to Warsaw – that is, they gave me a certificate saying I could practise the profession of visual artist indefinitely. I received the qualifications in 1998. I also had a craft workshop, because I submitted my work for assessment. The head of the craft association said: If your pictures sell, we shall admit you to the craft, on a trial basis – and they did. The pictures sold.

J.J.: You could already devote yourself entirely to painting then…

S.K.: No, I had a farm and it was something extra; I belonged to the craft association for about six years. I receive a supplement to my pension of about 100 zlotys a month.

J.U.: And I receive a supplement of twenty…

J.J.: Twenty zlotys?

J.U.: I paid contributions, I do not know how long – fifteen extra years – and everything I earned went to the Social Insurance Institution, and what I made, and you could not benefit twice from the same pot, so they gave me a supplement of twenty zlotys…

J.J.: And when did you begin earning money from your work?

J.U.: I worked and made them from time to time; if I spent the full eight hours on the machine, I would go home and work for another two or three hours. I took works to Warsaw; I still have receipts from Ars Polonia.

J.J.: Mr Stanisław, how long have you devoted yourself exclusively to painting? I see an enormous number of your pictures here.

S.K.: Well, I am eighty now, so I only paint. These are Mrs Jagoda’s pictures; she has been buying them for twenty years, but this is only some of them.

J.J.: If someone wanted to buy one, could they purchase a painting from you?

S.K.: I have none left; I have sold them all.

J.J.: What about at home? After all, you are still painting.

S.K.: I paint, but sell them as I go. They leave while they are still wet, so I have nothing. Nothing at home. I have so many commissions that I can no longer keep up; I paint four and send them off at once, still wet, to collectors.

J.J.: Are you not attached to them? Have you not kept one at home?

S.K.: Well, my daughter argues that nothing will remain after me. But why should I keep anything when I can paint new ones?

J.J.: You have painted humorous pictures most often. Did you paint them from the beginning of your creative work?

S.K.: At first I painted landscapes. I began painting humorous pictures later, after a satirical competition. I won first prize for humorous pictures in Legnica in 1996; at the international exhibition I won second prize. One year later, in 1997, I received a distinction there and then a prize, so three years in a row. But I still paint landscapes.

J.J.: Are the landscapes you paint the area where you live?

S.K.: No, it all comes from my imagination; I look at nothing.

J.J.: And why did you begin painting religious pictures, Mr Stanisław? 

S.K.: Well, it is a folk subject, but I have only painted religious works for a few years.

J.J.: Where do you draw inspiration for them?

S.K.: You could say from reading the Gospels, but it is my imagination. There was one way, so that is what you paint; the figure can be larger, but there is one version. The Last Supper is my own idea too; it is not Leonardo da Vinci, I worked out the style myself – Judas is walking towards the door with the money there. Folk artists are allowed their own subjects, because should I paint the Crucifixion and Resurrection only once? What if I need several dozen in a year?

J.J.: Folk artists are allowed?

S.K.: Well, if I painted only one, there would be too few pictures; this way they are all different. The craft association taught me a little about production-line work – the subjects recurred. I delivered one set of pictures and a moment later they were gone, so I had to paint new ones. There were craft shops in Włodawa, Lublin and Krasnystaw, and one week later I had to paint a new picture because those had sold. I would call and they would say I could bring new ones; tickets were cheaper then. Someone who paints little can do it, if they put a high price on their pictures. But the craft taught me to paint a lot… I once had a solo exhibition in Legnica with more than a hundred humorous pictures, and every one had to be different.

J.J.: How long did it take to prepare so many pictures? 

S.K.: About a month…

J.J.: I am very impressed by the speed at which you work. But I wonder where you found so many ideas, enough for three pictures a day?

S.K.: It all comes from my imagination. I do not read newspapers or watch television; I do not have one.

J.J.: You, on the other hand, Mr Jan, devote a great deal of space in your work to folk themes.

J.U.: Yes, I make a great many angels. I once thought of focusing only on angels and making nothing else, because I had read so much about them. There are nine orders of angels, divided into choirs. Here, everyone only knows one angel; they think there is one kind, with wings, and that is all. But there are many more angels, different kinds: cherubim, seraphim, archangels, thrones and powers, and each has its own domain.

J.J.: But you sculpt more than figurines of angels.

J.U.: No, not only those. I had a series called Guardian Angel, where the angel looked after children when they played football or rode skateboards. And I am preparing this large sculpture now, a Christmas tree of angels, as some call it. And it contains the different kinds of angels.

J.J.: It is a complicated composition. Where did the idea come from?

J.U.: It all comes from my imagination.

J.J.: How long does it take you to create such a composition?

J.U.: This one is specifically for the exhibition. I have already spent a month on it and the end is nowhere in sight. More than two months altogether. I still have to make their instruments, more stars and clouds so that there is no empty space. And finally the signature. It always changes during the process; there were to be kneeling angels too, but the structure would not bear them. Then I shall paint it with watercolours; it needs to dry, because normally that alone would take three days. At the end I use a varnish that is so subtle you cannot even tell it is there.

J.J.: And have you made any sculptures for a church?

J.U.: I made one cross once; they always laid it out for the blessing of Easter baskets, and the women kissed it so much… But that cross is gone now. The priest left and the cross disappeared somewhere. I am also planning to make a cross for the exhibition.

J.J.: Like Mr Stanisław, you also create works inspired by everyday life.

J.U.: It varies. I spot something on the street, see a little animal in a field, and it stays inside me, I carry it with me. But there is not so much of that. I also make women, such as toothless singers, because the professional ones on television always have such nice teeth. There are also reliefs of Chełm residents.

J.J.: You also made a large relief, called Frankfurt, I believe.

J.U.: That came from my trip to Germany… The wind turbines in Germany, how many of them there are; the European Central Bank is in Frankfurt. We were on the fifty-second floor and saw it from above, so it looks just as it does in the sculpture: here is the airport, little houses and masses of cars; no people are visible at all.

J.J.: You mentioned earlier the competitions you entered. How did you find your first competition?

J.U.: We belong to an association; they send invitations.

S.K.: I was admitted to the association in Lublin; I took pictures there to be assessed, and later they notified us of competitions.

J.J.: How often do you enter competitions?

J.U.: It is much worse with competitions now. There used to be one every month; invitations came from one place and another, but now there are fewer.

S.K.: Most recently they sent me a distinction from Toruń, but without any money, only a diploma.

J.J.: I thought folk themes were popular again now.

J.U.: There was more interest in the past. Cepelia recently announced a competition in Warsaw too, for things in folk style; some bags won, craftspeople won, but folk artists not at all. Because it was all for serial production. It was the professionals who mostly won, perhaps just one folk artist. Some sort of little clay shrine. And we had something at that exhibition too, but they forgot about us.

J.J.: So it was not a competition only for folk artists?

J.U.: It was a mixture, professionals and folk artists alike.

J.J.: And what, in your view, is the difference between a professional and a folk artist?

J.U.: To me my colleague Koguciuk is a folk artist. I do not know… someone who makes something derived from the people, from their family. Here, a folk artist cannot have an art education; they must be self-taught. In the past they could not even have completed secondary school…

S.K.: For example, I sketch nothing; I paint everything immediately, no sketches, everything at once.

J.U.: In the past, primary school and nothing more was best; that was how it used to be. Or a grandfather had completed two years, but now I see that even teachers are folk artists.

J.J.: So in your opinion anyone can be a folk artist now?

J.U.: Yes, it is fashionable now; if someone cannot break into the professional world, they come here.

J.J.: In that case, are you now able to support yourselves from your work alone?

S.K.: Well, in Bielsko-Biała the first prize paid two thousand, but that was a few years ago. Now it is commissions. Sometimes I take work to Lublin, to Kazimierz.

J.U.: I sell it myself, and to the museum too. My works are also in Łódź, because they bought my sculptures, at 14 Plac Wolności (the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography in Łódź). I make things, but not for anyone in particular – for myself. I work independently, without an agency, because if I had to share the proceeds… How would I deliver them? I make four sculptures, one goes in tax, then add the journey. And buy wood; there is a felling and no one can drive there, so you take a horse, then a van from the forest; transport is expensive. We folk artists used to be looked after; the state cared for us, sent invitations to events. There was an allowance and food, expenses reimbursed, everything. We paid no taxes. When I worked, I was not to exceed two or three hundred thousand; if I had earned that, there would have been tax, but no one exceeded it. 

J.J.: So now you have been left to fend for yourselves.

J.U.: Well, we have the association, but perhaps it is time for young people to take over.