Albert Oszek - The Social Trilogy: LIMBO

The artist presents a series of paintings and objects entitled Limbo – Voices of the Forgotten, the theme of which corresponds to Luc Boltanski’s cantata Les Limbes. In his work, the French sociologist created a metaphor of an impoverished life of suspension in the void caused by the exclusion from the society. In the eponymous limbo, people are waiting for selection, hoping that when its result is favourable, they will be able to leave their current place of stay, start a happy life and enjoy a better social status. Awaiting the verdict, they find themselves small niches – this may be a newspaper placed on the floor, a bus stop shelter, a few disused tires, an old mattress tucked into a corner, or a large doll house. We are led to all these places by the character of a wanderer, who meets persons dear to him, one by one. The song of the wanderer intertwines with the anguished voices of the forgotten, who sing, among others, about forced expropriation, disqualification and ceaseless waiting. Albert Oszek’s work refers to particular fragments of Boltanski’s poems. In his canvases, the artist presented the inhabitants of the limbo, while the objects located in the gallery space, prepared especially for the event (tires, a mattress, a doll house with the figure of a woman reading obituaries) visualised the places in which the unfortunate people dwelled. The figures are presented in a way which suggests their belonging to the underworld of the dead – thus, the artist symbolically points to the social death awaiting all the excluded, whether due to economic reasons or any other ones. The aura of sorrow, dejection and melancholy prevalent in this work is meant to reflect modern neuroses and frustrations.