JAPANESE TEXT

Wojtek Ulrich's metal murals are metaphors for the violence and decay of an old civilization, and at the same time, for the common man, with the power and stamina he has to build a vibrant new civilization. The rust that covers the metal surfaces refers, of course, to decay, but also to metamorphosis, to greatness emerging from the mundane. There is a stateliness and grandeur to these works that makes no demands on the viewer but which extends a warm invitation to peruse the varied surfaces.

The strict geometry that the constituent parts of a work makes is contrasted by the ephemeral accidents of wear and tear and corrosion of the iron sheets. Murals are made so as to physically involve a viewer, as opposed to just visually, as with an easel painting. Its grand size envelops the viewer, and one must move one's head or body in order to take in the whole.

It is not that a mural has more to say than a small picture does, but scale and pshysicality is itself a valid motif, which Ulrich has taken up with dramatic flair.