ROCKFORD ART MUSEUM | COLLECTION | CONTEMPORARY GLASS

Janusz Walentynowicz

Janusz Walentynowicz’s glass sculptures defy the normal expectations of the transparency and brilliant color glass is supposed to possess. Rather his glass work is often pitted, the colors dark and dingy and in most situation the clarity of the glass is cloudy to opaque. Walentywicz is one of the few artists who has been able to transcend his medium.

At heart Walentynowicz is an expressionist. The greater majority of his works are figurative but without the reference of a model. His figures are often stilted and awkward, out of proportion and expressive both facially and in the posses they adopt. As with most expressionistic work there is a very strong personal element throughout his work. In Walentynowicz’s case, his relationship and the early death of his father find its way into many works.

Walentynowicz doesn’t sketch many of his works beforehand. Rather, he prefers to work out the issues of each sculpture in the wax model that will be used to create the sandmold that the glass is to be cast in. He creates his own glass and chooses the clearness, cloudiness, opacity and texture for the greatest psychological impact. “Glass insists that we look into it, that we not stop at the surface of what is shown,” he says, “The emotional states depicted here are points of easily disturbed equilibriums between inner and outer states.”

Art of Janusz Walentynowicz, Polish Museum of Art, 1996, p. 8