Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/936285
maltatoday SUNDAY 4 FEBRUARY 2018 32 This Week Could you tell us a little bit about your beginnings and training as a visual artist? And what led you to Malta, to focus on the kind of work that you will be exhibiting in this show, in particular? I come from Poland, where culture and the arts play a fun- damental role, and have helped us to survive the worst moments in our history. People like me, who have been trained in the Polish school of Fine Arts, all started our careers as colour- ists following the 'Capist' and 'Fauvism' aesthetics in painting. But then, we were also strong- ly influenced by artists like Władysław Strzemiński, who not only aimed to transform so-called 'high art' – painting, sculpture, architecture – but what was broadly understood to be 'design' at the time. I started painting at the Community Arts Centre in Poland at age 10, and continued my traditional art ed- ucation both in the High School of Arts and the Academy of Fine Arts. The 'Embedded' project was developed during my Painting in Contemporary practice course at Slade School of Fine Arts last summer. I brought the project to the studio and it was a very long and challenging process. I ended up doing sculptures to recreate the elemental process of fossilisation, and then work- ing on print reliefs and paint- ings. I've been fascinated with ma- rine fossils for many years. I've made many sketches, studies and photographs of them. When you go for a walk around Malta you can find a number of beau- tiful and well-preserved fossils imprinted on the Maltese rock layers. When you look at them closely, this preserved evidence of ancient life becomes your world, in that moment. I dis- covered them during one of my walks. They have different shapes, patterns and textures, and they are deeply embedded in our rocks. They were also living organisms, once upon a time. I've decided to study them closely and give them a new life and meaning. I want the au- dience to notice their beauty through painting, but also re- flect on subjects like embodi- ment, resemblance and disap- pearance. Was the natural world always a key inspiration for your work, and what's your process usually like when it comes to directly transmuting that inspiration into tangible works? I wouldn't say that the natural world is a key inspiration for my work. Everything is an inspira- tion. My process is rooted in the Adventures in Biomorphic Abstraction TEODOR RELJIC speaks to Polish- born, Malta-based painter Wioletta Kulewska about her new exhibition of paintings, Embedded, which takes its cue from 'the elemental process of fossilisation' Blue - Composition I by Wioletta Kulewska (oil paint and charcoal on canvas, 140 x 200cm) Untitled, no.3-6 by Wioletta Kulewska (oil paint & 22K Gold leaf on board, 50 x 60cm)