24 IV 1990

Description of the manifestation:

The audience sits on benches along the walls. In the center of the room are two tables. On the first are glasses and a bottle of vodka; on the second lies a chessboard. The pieces are arranged in the configuration of a game. Between the tables is a low, black platform on which rests a large stone.

The artist enters naked, stands before the audience, and says: I would like to signal that this will be about the responsibility of the artist and the viewer. The issues I wish to highlight seem so overwhelming that I feel entangled in them. But I think that with your help, something will become clear. He approaches the table with glasses, pours vodka into one of them, takes a cup of paint, and paints a red stripe on his back. He then approaches the table with the chessboard and begins a game with himself. After moving the black piece, he paints a black mark on his chest; after moving the white piece, he paints a white mark. Together, they form the black-and-white letter G. He moves to the table with glasses, pours more vodka, and paints a red stripe on his back. He returns to the chessboard, continues moving pieces, and simultaneously paints another letter on his chest. The artist repeats this sequence with concentration until the whole vodka is poured into glasses, his back is covered in red stripes, and the black-and-white word GRZECH (SIN) appears on his chest. He then paints a white dot on his penis.

He takes the bottle, walks to the black podium, picks up a stone, and addresses the audience: Marcel Duchamp once said he would throw the bottle, and they would make a work of art out of it. Thus he signaled a problem that, in my opinion, now overwhelmingly dominates not only the field of art but many other fields as well. Fetishization… Because what else could be substituted for the value that Duchamp thus articulated? He walks naked before the audience, the word GRZECH (SIN) across his chest, holding the bottle and the stone. He continues: Moreover, there is this precise problem I signal with the title I wrote here, because I believe that Duchamp sinned – he sinned by making himself irresponsible for his act, shifting responsibility onto those who made a work of art out of that very bottle. And that is why I will not make a work of art out of that bottle. He stops and strikes the bottle against the stone.

It shatters with a loud bang, glass scattering across the floor. The author places the stone on the floor, steps beyond the shards, and says: But Duchamp approached the problem at the level of the object, because he operated with the object. Other artists, including myself, threw not a bottle, but our own person. And here the problem arises on a completely different level – when a person becomes a fetish. The drama begins when a nation considers itself the chosen nation. I would like to warn my nation, the Poles, against making ourselves the chosen nation. And such theories were propagated, under one or another externally obscuring slogan. Because this is nothing other than a source of nationalism. Suffice it to mention the tragedy of the Germans, etc. This is just a general reflection. The main point, and what prompted me to organize today’s manifestation, is the discussion I had two months ago. I presented a thesis on the margins of another manifestation that normative ethics have one weakness: they tolerate kitsch. I said that Christianity, as we know it, also tolerates kitsch because there is so much of it in churches. Some people, very familiar with Christian ethics, told me kitsch was a sin, and that I was wrong. I defended myself by asking, ‘Why is there so much kitsch in churches?’ Now it occurs to me that the problem is not so simple. When we talk about kitsch, we mean the object, but we overlook the person behind it, who ceases to be important. And that is precisely the Duchampian circle – Duchamp too, made himself irresponsible for his work. I therefore propose the thesis that it is not true that kitsch is a sin.

At this point, the author steps onto the black pedestal and continues: Now, returning to the beginning: just as Duchamp played with objects, we performers – because I was almost forced into this category – have become entangled in this dilemma of throwing ourselves into the whole conglomeration of fetishization and idolomania, from which there is no escape. That is why I am asking for your opinions on this matter: what solution can be found? I propose a judgment, a judgment of what you see at this moment. The author stands naked on a black pedestal, with the inscription GRZECH (SIN) on his chest.