Since Febr. the 2nd 2024, the Museum of the Lubuskie Region in Zielona Góra is exhibiting - partly in shared interiors - the double exhibition "Everything is a landscape. The Sorbian painter Jan Buck" and "Hommage à Jan Buck (IV): EVERYWHERE - NOWHERE - HOME" which will run until May, 5th, 2024. However, it can only be viewed in its entirety for three days (until March 3rd, 2024)!!! After that, its part in the Stained Glass Hall will be replaced by a display of Easter eggs.
Nearly 300 people attended the crowded opening of the double exhibition, which was honoured by a performance by the vocal ensemble MAMADA. The preceding international research symposium “`Hommage à Jan Buck’ – Lubuskie and Lower Silesian contexts: geography, history and art”, prepared by PhD Lidia Głuchowska from the Institute of Visual Arts at the University of Zielona Góra, explained why the “Hommage à Jan Buck” project was born in Zielona Góra and why its culminating edition is taking place here.
Extensive coverage of the symposium`s proceedings can be found, e.g, on the Universtit of Zielona Góra website
https://uz.zgora.pl/aktualnosci/miedzynarodowe-sympozjum-hommage-a-jan-buck-wielojezyczne-echo-zielonogorskiej-awangardy-na-dzikim- zachodzie-3953.html
and Museum Ziemi Lubuskiej website https://mzl.zgora.pl/aktualnosci/relacja-z-miedzynarodowego-sympozjum-badawczego/
PhD Głuchowska`s research reveals that Jan Buk/Buck (1922–2019), regarded as the most prominent Sorbian artist, maintained lasting contacts with many visual artists from Poland, including the entire pantheon of founders of Lubuskie institutions and cyclical art events – the Golden Grape and the Biennale of New Art. These included Klemens Felchnerowski, Zygmunt Pranga, Witold Nowicki and Stefan Słocki, as well as the co-founder of the Institute of Visual Arts – Zenon Polus – co-organiser of the first Symposium of the Europa Biennale in Lusatia. This was a series of plein-air events lasting several weeks, which – like the Energy Plein-air which followed it – founded the links between artists from Lusatia and Zielona Góra. The Museum of the Lubuskie Land itself hosted another exhibition of (Lower)Sorbian artist of the previous generation in 2013 – Wylem Śybar/Wilhelm Schieber (whom Jan Buk/Buck knew from the Working Group of Sorbian Artists) from the collection of the Sorbian Museum from our partner city Chóśebuz/Cottbus.
In the exhibition “Everything is a Landscape. The Upper Lusatian painter Jan Buck”, with reference to the research findings of the head of the project “Hommage à Jan Buck”, PhD Głuchowska, and to her original programme for the symposium, on the initiative of the exhibition curator Marta Gawęda-Szymaniak, in the interior in front of the entrance to the conference room, mirroring the works of Jan Buck, hangs the works of the last living Lubusian witnesses of the era and friends of this Upper Lusatian artist – Adam Bagiński, Henryk Krakowiak and Grażyna Michalak-Bazylewicz. This is, as a pars pro toto – a signal of his long-standing relationship with the artistic community of Zielona Góra and the millennia-long relationship between Poles and Lusatians....
In addition, the exhibition features almost 50 works by Buck himself, who created for more than half a century, which give a good indication of the direction of his stylistic development – even though this is only a selection from the collection of the Sorbian Museum in Budyšin/Bautzen. In his late work, he reached the limits of abstraction, creating still lifes identical to landscapes and landscapes like still lifes. This is the reason for the title of his exhibition, which is enriched by an interactive presentation on a stele with photographic documentation and texts that provide an in-depth insight into his biography and his entire oeuvre, which includes, in addition to easel paintings in the spirit of his Wrocław- based colourism – where he studied in the first post-war years – as well as prints and spontaneous ink drawings, also monumental works – mosaics, stained glass and monuments.
In three of the exhibition`s five rooms, Jan Buck`s works are presented together with realisations by 21 employees of the UZ Institute of Visual Arts specially prepared for the exhibition "Hommage à Jan Buck (IV): EVERYWHERE – NOWHERE – AT HOME” (curator: PhD Radosław Czarkowski, Prof. UZ, ISW). These include paintings, prints, drawings, films, installations and objects. All of them refer in various ways to the subtitle of the exhibition, while some of them also deal with the subject of national minorities and multiple identities as well as migration and the cartography of the cross-border Lusatian region, as does the entire “Hommage a Jan Buck” project.
Photos: 2, 3, 5–7, 9, 11, 19–21, 28–30 – Mariola Nehrebecka, 22–27 – Anna Mazurkiewicz, 14 – Łukasz Wawer (LCI), pozostałe Oleksii Soboliev
Cf. MZL's coverage of the double opening https://mzl.zgora.pl/wystawy/wszystko-jest-pejzazem-serboluzycki-malarz-jan-buck-oraz-hommage-a-jan-buck-iv-wszedzie-nigdzie- dom/
Please find the lists of works from both exhibitions in the appendices below:
“Everything is a Landscape. The Sorbian painter Jan Buck”:
Jan Buk/Buck and the last of his living Lubusian friends from the Energy Plein Air and Biennale Europa - Adam Bagiński, Henryk Krakowiak and Grażyna Michalak-Bazylewicz (until April, 11th , 2024). PDF 1
“Hommage à Jan Buck (IV): EVERYWHERE – NOWHERE – AT HOME”:
– Paweł Andrzejewski, Cezary Bednarczyk, Kacper Będkowski, Andrzej Bobrowski, Radosław Czarkowski, Piotr Czech, Katarzyna Dziuba, Joanna Fuczko, Magdalena Gryska, Mirosław C. Gugała, Jarek Jeschke, Paulina Komorowska-Birger, Marek Lalko, Alicja Lewicka-Szczegóła, Liwia Litecka, Jarosław Łukasik, Maryna Mazur, Anna Owsian, Katarzyna Smugarzewska, Karolina Spiak, Piotr Szurek PDF 2
Dr. Lidia Głuchowska, together with partners from Lusatia, ensured that the Lower and Upper Lusatian languages could be heard at the opening (and the symposium), supporting also the MAMADA ensemble in acquiring the lyrics of traditional songs from both parts of Lusatia. To thank the MAMADA ensemble, we are publishing below two recordings from their concert which graced our vernissage.
