Firefly and Fish

Returning to painting.

This painting is especially important to me. I painted it during an illness and had to break through a creative impasse to return to it. Each stage meant working on the composition and finding my way back to making art.

I began on New Year’s Eve 2022 with my characteristic runes. I treat them as a signature and a spell with which I start making a work. I returned to the next stages a few months later and completed the painting in spring 2023.

I painted water lilies, reeds and rippling lines of water. I also introduced three elements: a fish’s movement shown in successive phases, reflected light in pearl paint and the real light of an LED.

I also design and build mechatronic elements for films, combining mechanics, electronics and programming to give physical objects movement and light. While this painting was taking shape, I was making such elements for three films: “Faun” (a French production), “Ro” (a Polish-British production) and “Dziewczyna Szatana” (a Polish production).

The firefly grew out of that work. I brought my experience from film sets into the painting: a small circuit hidden behind it lets a real light glow above the painted water. This is how I bring films and paintings to life, connecting storytelling with matter, movement and light.