Dimensions: 80 x 120 cm
signed, dated and described on the reverse: 'ZBYLUT GRZYWACZ | "CORRIDA - PEGAZ" | 80 x 120 cm. 1977'
Origin:
private collection, Poland
DESA Unicum, 2023
private collection, Warsaw
Exhibited
Zbylut Grzywacz, Exhibition of Painting, "Gil" Gallery, Cracow University of Technology Employees Club, Cracow, December 1977 - January 1978.
15th Wprost exhibition, BWA Gallery of Contemporary Art, Opole, March - April 1978
VII Festival of Fine Arts "Warsaw '78", Zachęta Gallery, Warsaw, September 1978 [painting Corrida - Pegasus (Corrida III) removed by censors].
II All-Poland Exhibition "Art of Fact '78", BWA Bydgoszcz, November - December, 1978 [award from the Ministry of Culture and Art for three out of four (censored) submitted paintings from the "Beef" series].
III Triennial of Painting and Graphics "Our Time - Metaphor - Tendencies", BWA, Lodz, June - July 1979.
Otwarta Pracownia (Open Workshop), a month-long permanent show at Zbylut Grzywacz's studio at 17/22A Białoprądnicka Street in Cracow, 1982-1983
Literature
15th WPROST exhibition, exhibition catalog at the BWA Gallery of Contemporary Art in Opole, 1978
VII Festival of Fine Arts "Warsaw '78", exhibition catalog at Zachęta Gallery, Warsaw, 1978
II All-Poland Exhibition "Art of Fact '78", exhibition catalog at BWA in Bydgoszcz, 1978
III Triennial of Painting and Graphics "Our Time - Metaphor - Tendencies", exhibition catalog at BWA in Lodz, 1979
Zbylut Grzywacz. Painting, exhibition catalog at BWA in Kielce, 1991, il. 29
Wrośnięcie. With Barbara Skąpska, interviewed by Grzegorz Bednarski [in:] The World Presented? On the "Wprost" group, ed. M. Kitowska-Łysiak, Lublin 2006, p. 266.
Zbylut Grzywacz 1939-2004, exhibition catalog, [eds.] J. Boniecka, J. Waltoś, MNK, Kraków 2008, cat. no. 254 (ill.), p. 348 and p. 72 (ill.) et al. [the 1978 date in the catalog is incorrect].
Tadeusz Nyczek, Rozdwojony, [in:] Zbylut Grzywacz. 1939-2004, ed. schol. J. Boniecka and J. Waltoś, catalog of the exhibition at the National Museum in Cracow March-June 2009, MNK, Cracow 2008, pp. 283-293 (about the Beef series pp. 288-289)
Joanna Boniecka, Zbylut Grzywacz 1939-2004: A guide to the exhibition, MNK, Kraków 2009, p. 12.
Stanisław Primus, Beauty rescued by truth... critical kitsch, in "The artist towards himself and society" - the work of Zbylut Grzywacz and its contexts. Materials from the scientific conference at the National Museum in Krakow May 7-8, 2009, [ed.] J. Boniecka, Krakow 2010, pp. 59-67
Wojciech Bałus, Zbylut Grzywacz's "Help". On metaphor and metonymy in "marny time", [in:] "The Artist towards Himself and Society". The oeuvre of Zbylut Grzywacz and its contexts, ed. J. Boniecka, materials from the scientific conference at the National Museum in Krakow May 7-8, 2009, MNK, Krakow 2010, pp. 205-216 (on the Beef series pp. 208-209)
Wprost 1966-1986, exhibition catalog at the Manggha Museum of Japanese Art and Technology, Kraków, 2016
Agata Stronciwilk, Community, body, politics. Aesthetic and cultural contexts of food in Polish contemporary art, doctoral dissertation written under the supervision of Dr. Maria Popczyk, Prof. UŚ, Katowice 2018, pp. 145-159 (chapter: "Wprost" about food - the political dimension of cuisine in the painting of Zbylut Grzywacz).
Patrycja Cembrzyńska, Zbylut Grzywacz - Scenes from the Corrida, socialism with a beefy face, in Poland 1944/45-1989. Studies and Materials, Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences Publishing House, 2022
Biography
Graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow in 1963 in the studio of E. Krcha. Since 1972 he worked at the Academy of Fine Arts, and in 1991 became its professor. As a painter, draughtsman, sculptor, graphic artist, writer, photographer, essayist and educator, he was active in many artistic fields. He was also a lover and expert in paleontology, collecting stones and popularizing science and art. Together with his wife Maria, he created and ran the ESTE Gallery of Curiosities and the ESTE School of Drawing and Painting in Cracow. In 1966, he founded together with M. Bieniasz, J. Waltos and L. Sobocki of the "Wprost" group. His early work was influenced by F. Bacon with his characteristic deformations and exaggerations. Later he used more realistic means of expression. During the communist era, he was interned as a democratic oppositionist during martial law. In the early 1980s he created the series "Wisnica Retreat" and "Spring 1982," in which he referred to martial law, depicting still lifes with pieces of bread and chains. Later, he returned to the theme of the female nude, painting bodies stigmatized with scars and scarring. Since 1989, he painted nudes, but already in the convention of affirmation of life and beauty.
He had about 70 solo exhibitions, more than 20 held as part of the Wprost group (1966-1986 and 2016) and about 200 national and international group exhibitions. The artist's works can be found in the collections of most Polish museums, as well as Polish and foreign private collections. In 2009, a posthumous retrospective of the artist was held at the National Museum in Krakow. The exhibition was accompanied by an extensive catalog entitled "Zbylut Grzywacz 1939-2004, edited by J. Boniecka and J. Waltos, the result of five years of research devoted to the legacy and reception of the artist.
