Ryszard Woźniak

Ryszard Woźniak (b. 1956 in Białystok) is a painter, performer, creator of installations, art theorist and teacher. He studied painting at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts (1976-81, in the studio of Stefan Gierowski, diploma with distinction). In 1982-92 he co-created - together with Ryszard Grzyb, Paweł Kowalewski, Jarosław Modzelewski, Włodzimierz Pawlak and Marek Sobczyk - the artistic formation Gruppa, co-published its magazine „Oj dobrze już” and took part in most of its exhibitions and actions.

As a member of Gruppa, Woźniak represents the current of the new expression: in the 1980s he created „wild”, expressive works in strong colouring, commenting on the reality of the People's Republic, and in the 1980s he co-created the independent culture movement. His attitude consists in the conceptual use of the picture as a carrier of meaning - he problematises painterly forms, operating with sign, symbol and metaphor and building his own expressive idioms; important media for him are also installation (sometimes from his own paintings) and performance. He is the author of the concepts of „art of protest” and „art of admiration”.

Together with Marek Sobczyk he made the polychrome of the Neo-Uniate Orthodox church in Kostomłoty on the Bug, and with Ryszard Grzyb he held a residency in West Berlin; he also co-ran the private School of Art in Warsaw (with Modzelewski and Sobczyk). From 1992, for many years, he ran a painting studio at the University of Zielona Góra, where he is a professor. His works are held, among others, in the National Museums in Warsaw and Kraków, the Zachęta and the Museum of Art in Łódź.