Zygmunt Rytka
Zygmunt Rytka was a self-taught Polish photographer and filmmaker whose interest in photography exposed him to new tendencies in media art and performance. His early projects came close to analytical conceptualism, in which the camera becomes the instrument in a quasi-scientific investigation. This work saw him to develop a methodology that became useful later on in researching the official propaganda of the People’s Republic of Poland. Rytka was especially fond of working with reference to the consumerist language that became one of the staples of the public sphere in the mid-1970s. He joined a
group of artists whose work revolved around these issues that included Janusz Haka and Zdzisław Sosnowski. Rytka’s output from this period focuses on commodity fetishism and its connection with political propaganda. In 1978, he embarked upon his biggest project—entitled “Photovision”—which consisted of over 5,000 television screen photographs depicting images from the official TV channels. This massive archive documents the language of the public sphere in late-communist Poland. Another major strand of Rytka’s work was devoted to the documentation of artistic life, as part of which he photographed exhibitions and unofficial artistic events. This activity became the basis for “Private Collection”—a series of hand-colorized photographs with images of artists representing different tendencies and generations. In the 1980s, he became close to “Pitch-In Culture” (Kultura Zrzuty), an underground movement of neo-dada provenance that was oriented around issues pertaining to the formation of independent collaborative networks and the exchange of artistic ideas. At that time, Rytka began devoting his work to questions concerning the influence of culture on the natural world. The artist’s “Continuity of Infinity” series is based on the exploration of stones that he found in the Białka river. He ultimately produced photographs, a film, and installations employing objects found in the water there. D.M.
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