Interview. Katarzyna Przezwanska

Born in 1984, lives and works in Warsaw. She studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. In her artistic practice, she often refers to nature and architecture. She combines both of these fields in an effort to improve the quality of human life, trying to make art useful.
@przezwa
katarzynaprzezwanska.tumblr.com

Untitled, 2017 ostrich egg, chameleon nail powder, lacquer, metal, wood for Robert Świerczyńsk

What was your path in life?
I was born and grew up in Warsaw.
I got into the painting department at Fine Art Academy in Warsaw and after a while, it disappointed me badly. After the third year of studying, I was so depressed with it, that I decided to move to London with my boyfriend with no specific plan. I was working as an usher in the theatre and doing some graphic design internship.
After nine months we earned a lot of money and we went traveling for 3 months. It was a great trip, during which I’ve seen a lot (for instance we were following Le Corbusier buildings like some crazy psycho fans) and it was probably the most influential part of my education. After that, I came back to Warsaw and decided to finish studies. I was also thinking of studying architecture. But then it turned up that most things that I want, I can do within the „art area” anyway, so I stayed in there.

What is your art mainly about?
I have several paths in my work: I work on large scale in public space and at the same time I work on very small scale with sculptures, which may seem not so consistent at first glance.
But it is all the same and is connected by themes like vitality, color (also as something neglected in high culture), nature, human touch, sensuality, usefulness, being constructive instead of critical.
I like my works to be simple, straightforward and as little hermetic as possible, understandable also for people outside the art world. Even that they have the theoretical background, in its reception I want them to be also sensual, immediate, non-intellectual.

And what do your eggs stand for?
I work with artificiality mostly to emphasize the natural features of an object.

And your stones? Do they represent something in your life?
With stones it’s similar like with eggs – they’re very basic. It’s a simple, common, cheap, easily available and attractive thing, straight from the Earth. I think humans have an atavistic attraction for stones. I like to imagine how the stone was something that was alive once, and what it was going through for the span of millions of years. They are here much longer then I am, so it brings a good perspective. And I like to think that one day I will become one.

A movie, a song, a piece of art.
It changes all the time, I get stuck on songs. On movies not so much, but I did have a favorite one – it was „The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” by Jacques Demy.

What do you carry always with you to keep the bad energy away?
Painted nails.

Can you leave us with the last thing you saw which blew your mind?
Recently I was working with crab claws, preparing it to use it in sculpture and I loved it’s a mechanism.

Untitled, 2016 eggs, polyurethane, wood for Robert Głowack