Igor Mitoraj

Igor Mitoraj (1944, Oederan in Germany - 2014) was one of the most outstanding sculptors of the 20th century. He spent his childhood and youth in Grojec near Oświęcim; in 1963 he began his studies at the Faculty of Painting of the Kraków Academy of Fine Arts, where he studied under Tadeusz Kantor among others, and from 1968 he continued his education at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Until 1977 he was mainly engaged in painting and graphic art; a journey to Mexico and his encounter with pre-Columbian art directed him towards monumental sculpture. In 1985 he settled permanently in Pietrasanta in Italy, famous for its foundries and sculpture workshops.

The main theme of Mitoraj's sculptures is the human body - both its beauty and its fragility. Referring to the canon of antiquity and to the work of Michelangelo and Canova, the artist introduced deliberate defects into his works: cracks, losses, torn-off wings, bandaged faces and incomplete figures, which symbolise the frailty of human nature and prompt reflection on the condition of contemporary man. He worked at first in Carrara marble, later most often casting in bronze; the sculptor's characteristic, hidden „signature” is a mouth in the shape of his own.

Mitoraj's oeuvre was presented at about 120 exhibitions around the world; in 1986 he was invited to the Venice Biennale. His monumental sculptures stood in the most prestigious spaces - „Eros Bendato” in the Main Square of Kraków, „Tindaro Screpolato” in Warsaw, works in Pompeii, in the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento and the doors of the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri in Rome. The posthumous exhibition among the ruins of Pompeii (2016) drew crowds.