(text published in the catalogue of the exhibition “Bereś”, Cricoteka, Kraków 2024)

Jerzy Bereś is another artist from Tadeusz Kantor’s circle to be exhibited in Cricoteka’s new building. Previous years witnessed shows notably by Maria Stangret, Maria Jarema, Zbigniew Gostomski and the Second Group. Presented so far have been creative outputs of artists with strong ties to the Cricot 2 Theatre: Maria Jarema, its co-founder and costume maker, and some of its actors. Although their exhibitions were dedicated to visual works, each of them had also performed a significant role in Cricot’s history cocreating its productions.

The bonding element of this year’s show, the foundation on which it has been built is that the two artists, each a forceful personality, inhabited the same space-time. Particularly interesting from an institutional point of view is the question of how to protect and display their oeuvre, as well as of how their legacies impact on new generations of artists and viewers. In other words: is the work of Bereś and Kantor applicable to the world we live in today and can it be revisited fruitfully; if so – how is this to be done? Displayed within a short distance of one another throughout most of 2024, their works will be there for us to inspect them in search of new common points as yet undiscovered.

What remains of Jerzy Bereś’s work, how should we approach his manifestations, prophesies and his prescient act of faith – the faith in freedom, both the freedom of living in democracy as well as artistic freedom – that led to a fortunate breakthrough? Has this kind of faith become a thing of the past? Or, contrarily, perhaps now is the time to rethink his deliberations and aspirations?

Can Bereś’s sculpture reverberate in today’s world? What kind of dialogue is to be expected between those pure and simple works, highlighted by the white room and daylight, and Kantor’s exhibition next door with its blackness and assemblage of pieces that evoke trauma and programmed memories? Will the dissimilitude of the attitudes and creative paths chosen by the two pioneers in Polish performative art step forward or will their message be amplified?

It might be interesting to take a look back at some important moments in the artists’ encounters which were most intense in the 1960s. I had known Kantor by sight since I was a student. When he put on The Cuttlefish at the Artists’ Association, I went to see the performances,¹Jerzy Bereś, Egzystencję uczynić esencją, [in:] Zostawiam światło bo zaraz wrócę. Tadeusz Kantor we wspomnieniach swoich aktorów, ed. Jolanta Kunowska, Kraków 2005, p. 41. recalls Bereś.

Jerzy Bereś, “Beautiful Phantom” (1960).

In 1962, the artists meet in the Planty where Bereś is mounting an exhibition. We started socialising with each other quite a lot. We often paid each other visits with our wives. There was a lot to talk about because this weird thing was happening globally in art and Kantor believed that what I had been doing for several years was part of it. Tachisme, matter painting, and the general vogue for Henry Moore and then Chadwick in sculpture, were followed by ultimate academisation of the avant-garde on the one hand, and, on the other, a strong spirit of liberty that triggered the emergence of completely original, supermedia, individual productions in many different places around the world, all at the same time. In our conversations, we compared what we did with the artistic production of Oldenburg, Cage, Cèsar, Vostell or Beuys and, later on, with Segal and Kosuth. These confrontations were perforce theoretical because the Iron Curtain and a number of other circumstances would not allow a real one. But they helped us overcome an inferiority complex. The main problem we wanted to tackle was to find a way of giving expression to that universal spirit of freedom here in Poland, in Kraków. Kantor staged the Popular Exhibition. My Phantoms were presented at a large show in the Galeria Krzysztofory, but neither critics nor the audience were able to grasp what they were about…²Jerzy Bereś, Wstyd. Między podmiotem a przedmiotem, Stowarzyszenie Artystyczne Otwarta Pracownia, Kraków 2002, p. 118.

Mutual support and dialogue were immanent features of their relationship at the time. Kantor wrote to Bereś from Paris:

A while ago Staś Bal[lewicz] sent me. / The catalogue from your show. / I was most glad / To see it finally happened. / A collector is interested in getting / one of your sculptures / for his garden. / Should you be interested, why don’t you / Send him a couple of photos (…) / … Recently I have been / to a salon / of young sculpture – / a lot of iron (old / and new) / All things alike / = boring – / I would even say / poor. / If only they had here / Your works! / Do try / to come and show them in Paris…³Tadeusz Kantor, Letter dated 29 June 1964, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. VII, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1992, pp. 79–80.

They are to collaborate in years to follow. Jerzy Bereś and Maria Pinińska-Bereś contribute to Kantor’s happenings by performing activities they come up with as autonomous participants. In 1965, Bereś and his wife take part in The Division Line, a re-enactment of Kantor’s first happening. One year later, the artists take a taxi to travel together to Puławy for the First Symposium of Artists and Scientists titled Art in a Changing World. Kantor produces an object called Cyclist (Emballage-voyageur), and Bereś his two final Phantoms: Great Phantom and Puławy Phantom. In 1967, Bereś makes The Raft of the Medusa as part of Kantor’s Panoramic Sea Happening, while Maria Pinińska carries suitcases around the place during the action which is finally left out by Kantor; she will be, however, noticed by researchers and critics investigating the event (Jerzy Hanusek⁴Jerzy Hanusek, “O pewnych aspektach «Panoramicznego Happeningu Morskiego» Tadeusza Kantora”, Estetyka i Krytyka 2014, v. 35, no. 4, online: http://pjaesthetics.uj.edu.pl/documents/138618288/138854213/eik_35_5.pdf/29ed0f78-da7f-4246-99ef-5b6ee66959ef [accessed 28 Feb 2024].). In relation to the happening, Bereś performs his own act: he drives a wooden stake into the sand and keeps going around it with a piece rope tied around his neck. In this way, he stresses his distant attitude towards the idea of happening.

Jerzy Bereś assembles the mast for the “Raft of the Medusa” during Tadeusz Kantor’s “Panoramic Sea Happening”, Łazy, August 25, 1967.

The year 1968 was utterly “appalling in terms of politics. First, the anti-Semitic events of March, and then the brotherly help provided to Czechoslovakia.”⁵Zbigniew Warpechowski, quoted after J. Michalik, op. cit., p. 108. Kantor was abroad when that happened, yet before leaving on 8th March for Nuremberg, he was able to take part in Prophesy II, an action Bereś’s mounted at the Galeria Krzysztofory.

On his return in autumn 1968, Kantor presents the happening Hommage a Maria Jarema at Krzysztofory to commemorate the tenth anniversary of Jarema’s death. Partaking in the event is a rather large group of Kantor’s students (he takes charge of the Painting Department at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków on 1st October 1968) and a bunch of hippies remembered by Jacek Maria Stokłosa: It seemed that all the dissenting youth in Kraków gathered around Kantor. Krzysztofory became a mecca for hippies, and Tadeusz defended them against the authorities. The militia began launching raids on the gallery, staging provocations…⁶Jacek Maria Stokłosa, Krzysztofory, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. V, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1992, p. 6.

Even so, the venue continues to host consecutive events; in November, Jerzy Bereś is there with another of his actions: …Vladimir Preclik, a sculptor and dissident, is visiting Kraków. To mark the occasion Bereś carries out, in the Krzysztofory Café, a manifestation called Bread Painted Black. It is his way of expressing opposition to the situation in Czechoslovakia and propaganda lies about it.⁷Jerzy Hanusek, Kalendarium Jerzego Beresia, online: https://beresfoundation.pl/kalendarium-jerzy/ [accessed 28 Feb 2024]. The Second Group (Jacek Maria Stokłosa, Lesław and Wacław Janicki) use the Ixi washing powder to clean the café floor for the Czech dissident in an action called Ixi.

Jerzy Bereś, “Bread painted black”, café in the Krzysztofory gallery (November 11, 1968).

In 1969, between January and March, Kantor and Bereś participate in the Winter Assemblage at the Galeria Foksal. The invitation stated that the event was to include “independent actions undertaken by artists at any place and at any time.” As part of the Assemblage, portraits executed by the founders of Foksal are put in one of the gallery windows. A member of the gallery circle and participant in the Assemblage, Bereś most probably brought a photo that depicted him writing with his finger dipped in paint the word “fake” on a window pane. Ultimately, the photograph was not placed in the spot prepared for Bereś in the gallery window, but a photo of his hand was put in the bottom right corner.

Water-Hen was another production by Kantor Bereś took part in; he then joined the Cricot 2 Theatre as it went on its first foreign tour around Italy in 1969. The archive of Achille Perilli, an Italian artist, holds a voluminous correspondence with Tadeusz Kantor discussing details of the Italian trip and, first of all, the latter’s artistic activities in Poland. Kantor posted packets full of manifestos, photographs related to Cricot 2 and documentation of the art life in Kraków and Warsaw. Perilli translated and published these materials in Grammatica, a periodical he edited, and other magazines. A unique piece is found among these papers – a drawing by Kantor depicting the barrow from Bereś’s Prophesy.

Jerzy Bereś, “Falsehood” (1968/1969), photo by Jacek Stokłosa.

The year 1969 brought occurrences that were to become legendary and led to conflict between Bereś and Kantor. One of them was Kantor’s decision to throw the hippies out of Krzysztofory. The other was the fact that Kantor and the Foksal staff tried to persuade Bereś to withdraw his sculptures with political undertones from a group show the gallery was to present in Lausanne for fear of a possible adverse reaction on the part of the authorities. Bereś refused to do so and his pieces were finally put on display, but the relationship between the two artists deteriorated.

Still, both remain members of the Kraków Group (each serves as president of the Association at different times) and collaborators of the Galeria Krzysztofory. Their coexistence in Krzysztofory is understandably becoming increasingly difficult. In the 1970s, Kantor and his Cricot 2 Theatre achieve spectacular success. In 1975, The Dead Class is premiered. Jerzy Bereś recalls: Exhibitions could only take place when the theatre was on tour, mostly abroad. Money became a problem because the theatre did not yet have any foreign sponsors. The reports prepared for the authorities contained fictitious shows so that money could be received for theatrical productions. Discreetly at first and, later on, evidently, a revolt was coming within the Group – emotions were about to boil over but as soon as Kantor came into sight everybody changed the subject and joined Kantor in trying to get to grips with the multiple problems his theatre was beset with.⁸Jerzy Bereś, O awangardzie w Polsce i Krakowie, Grupa Krakowska, v. VII, op. cit., pp. 17–18. The need for a new institution devoted solely to Cricot matters became obvious. A solution came from abroad. Kantor and his team went to Florence and soon Cricoteka – Cricot 2 Theatre Centre was founded.

The 1980s were a very difficult time in Poland – directly after the declaration of martial law and in the years that followed, artistic activities were subjected to regulation, while artists believed it was imperative to act towards freedom. Jerzy Hanusek writes: The boycott against martial law spontaneously introduced by artistic circles went on; censors worked themselves in a frenzy of suspicion. The situation of the Kraków Group was better than that of other artists because it had a gallery of its own. Still, to put on exhibitions even in one’s own gallery invited more suspicion. All agreed that art needed to be shown. The inordinate number of presentations mounted in churches made that sufficiently clear. The point was not to lift the boycott and to resist censorship. The former would be an immoral thing to do, the latter was unacceptable for artistic reasons. That was when Jerzy Bereś suggested displaying the Group’s collection. The idea went back to the exhibition staged in July 1981, which had contained old pieces and had been meant as a filler show to go in the gap between scheduled ones. This time, it was supposed to be an insider-only event, advertised by neither posters nor announcements.⁹Jerzy Hanusek, Dokumenty i materiały, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. X, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1993, pp. 93–94.

Kantor keeps putting on productions abroad. Then, finally, a breakthrough comes and communism falls. Both artists actively engage in debates on the future of culture. A new chapter opens in the relationship: In 1989, Tadeusz delivered an unexpected panegyric on me in public and, yes, we reunited and the old quarrel lost its importance.¹⁰Jerzy Bereś, Egzystencję uczynić esencją…, op. cit., p. 47. After Kantor’s death, Bereś creates an extraordinary piece titled Dialogue with Tadeusz Kantor. Its title clearly reveals that Bereś thinks highly of Kantor – his earlier ‘interlocutors’ were Duchamp and Witkacy. The dialogues frequently assume the form of a dispute over the values artists consider absolutely crucial – those linked with art. In a conversation with Jolanta Kunowska, published in her book on Kantor, Bereś said: We communicated first of all on the artistic level. Art was his raison d’être.¹¹Ibidem.

Jerzy Bereś, “Dialogue with Tadeuszem Kantorem”, Krzysztofory Gallery, Kraków 27 V 1991, photo by Witold Górka.

In the 1990s, the café by the Galeria Krzysztofory, before its closure, boasted two sculptures – Pure Work by Jerzy Bereś and Funeral Machine by Tadeusz Kantor. To see once more the two pieces that used to be so strongly associated with the place displayed at parallel exhibitions is liable to rekindle memories of the venue that enjoyed cult status among many.

In 2024, Cricoteka offers an opportunity to look at these works and the artistic practices of both artists from a fresh angle, undisturbed by the disputes of the day. The matters addressed by Bereś and Kantor which have proven to be acutely relevant today include the importance of art, its place and role in contemporary world.

translated by Monika Ujma

• 1
  Jerzy Bereś, Egzystencję uczynić esencją, [in:] Zostawiam światło bo zaraz wrócę. Tadeusz Kantor we wspomnieniach swoich aktorów, ed. Jolanta Kunowska, Kraków 2005, p. 41.
• 2
  Jerzy Bereś, Wstyd. Między podmiotem a przedmiotem, Stowarzyszenie Artystyczne Otwarta Pracownia, Kraków 2002, p. 118.
• 3
  Tadeusz Kantor, Letter dated 29 June 1964, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. VII, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1992, pp. 79–80.
• 4
  Jerzy Hanusek, “O pewnych aspektach «Panoramicznego Happeningu Morskiego» Tadeusza Kantora”, Estetyka i Krytyka 2014, v. 35, no. 4, online: http://pjaesthetics.uj.edu.pl/documents/138618288/138854213/eik_35_5.pdf/29ed0f78-da7f-4246-99ef-5b6ee66959ef [accessed 28 Feb 2024].
• 5
  Zbigniew Warpechowski, quoted after J. Michalik, op. cit., p. 108.
• 6
  Jacek Maria Stokłosa, Krzysztofory, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. V, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1992, p. 6.
• 7
  Jerzy Hanusek, Kalendarium Jerzego Beresia, online: https://beresfoundation.pl/kalendarium-jerzy/ [accessed 28 Feb 2024].
• 8
  Jerzy Bereś, O awangardzie w Polsce i Krakowie, Grupa Krakowska, v. VII, op. cit., pp. 17–18.
• 9
  Jerzy Hanusek, Dokumenty i materiały, [in:] Grupa Krakowska, v. X, ed. Józef Chrobak, Kraków 1993, pp. 93–94.
• 10
  Jerzy Bereś, Egzystencję uczynić esencją…, op. cit., p. 47.
• 11
  Ibidem.