These are the snatches of the interview made for the the reporter of a newspaper; the name of the reporter and the name of the magazine won’t be given because we are simply unwilling to advertise mass media without having any consiedrable profit from such a promotion.

HALINA ANTOSZEWSKA

What was the inspiration for your works?

LEON GIRTAK

What?

H.A.

Well, the inspiration, the beginning, the general idea.

L.G.

Now I understand. So, in other words, how do the holes in the cheese come into existence? This inspiration, as you say, can be caused by many events, such as diahorea, a toothache, boredom, an angel’s sight form the outer world or just nothing; I don’t know it and now I really don’t want to get deeper into that matter.

H.A.

Why are you so formal while talking to me? We were supposed to speak per ‘you’.

L.G.

Yes, I know, but today definitely everyone speaks in such a way that for the sake of the conversation I wolud rather keep that distance between us. There is no reason to be so too friendly towards each other.

H.A.

And coming back to your inspirations…

L.G.

Inspirations, contemplations, immanent coincidences – what a horrible words! What the fuck do they mean? So many geniuses are now among us and they constantly quote some strange words so as to show their intelectual development and familiarity with literature studies, because it is so fashionable to know some words and use them all the time. Just to add to such a man a pair of binoculars and we have the typical example of an intellectualist, just like taken from the first book. 

H.A.

Sometimes there is difficult to find a good Polish word…

L.G.

And who had said that the foreign word will definitely depict the general idea of the meaning? Those are like empty words holding no real meaning in them, they are only pseudo-scientific mixtures of letters which are to have some dramatic effect upon all the uneducated people, but, in fact, they cause some astonishement – but only on groups of intellectualists keen on showing up, while a normal, thinking human momentarily will see all the superficiality of these terms. Artists, on the one hand, want to be absolutely intellectual, being perceived as the god-like creatures, they want to stand above all this world somewhere in the untouchable place, while on the other hand they are tepmted by the vision of being popular and well known both in the Luwre and in the city WC and at the same time creating this mysterious vocabulary, which is misunderstood by the masses and in fact put all these masses away –  such a procedure won’t generate popularity. These, so called, elites, also don’t understand most of their speeches, but they don’t want to clearly state their uneducation. So, the talkative artist is pretending that he knows what is talking about and all the time he invents new silly phrases. In the end, he is unable to create anything, because this searching for superficiality has grown on him so strongly that he is concerned only with expanding his vocabulary and revealing it to the desoriented surroundings. And the fact is that today the art is not seen using eyes, today the artist must say everything about his work to the very end – and that is why all this mess is created.

H.A.

But you should consider the fact that ever social group has its own vocabulary.

L.G.

Yes, of course, but we shouldn’t make the the sanctity from the shit. No one demands that the certain technical words should be replaced by these which can be understood by everyone; for example, plumbers and carpenters have their own slangs but they use their language only when speaking to each other, not when talking with common people. Apparently, artists with the feeling to complete a special mission force such common people to become angel-like. And we have a fucking mess here!

H.A.

And coming back to our topic…

L.G.

And what is the topic?

H.A.

The inspirations felt by Leon Girtak.

L.G.

Oh my God, again inspirations, but if we can’t speak in the other way so let it be.

H.A.

We are especially curious about your ‘Diary of the Madman’ and the matter what did you want to communicate through this work, how did you get the impulse to create it?

L.G.

I didn’t want to communicate anything, and, going further, today it’s no longer ‘Diary of the Madman’ because this title seems to be inappropriate. The title has been removed. This is normal, usual diary (or something of this kind) with illustrations and maybe this is only an exception form the usual form of diaries. There’s nothing special in it, many people nowadays write diaries, don’t they?

H.A.

But only a few of them use such a form.

L.G.

It is an individual approach, majority of people tend to draw some flowers or other silly images and I prefer something else – but the general idea reamins the same ‘ad perpetum rei memoriam’. Some diarists, for unknown reasons, want to leave a trace of their activity. A form has nothing to do in such a case, some of them would write ZENEK IS A DIPSHIT, another ones would paint ‘Mona Lisa’, and another writers would even jump out of the window. All these act have one thing in common – they are important only for these authors while the potentail receivers fuck all these lofty writnigs. So that is why I think that creating something for the audience and only for it is too naïve, tawdry and absolutely deprived of any sense of good taste and completelly inappropriate. Artistic work is like presenting snatches of our personality, it is thoroughly individual matter. And if somebody is inclined to have a great deal of joy out of it it is therefore very good – if not, it can be so. We must consider the fact that when the artist is engaging all his effort only to flatter audience’s tastes and whims, then he becomes nothing more than a cock, to write it with the capital C in order to stress it. And coming back to the question of the form – this form was the most convenient for me in this time, so that is why it looks as it appears.

H.A.

And my attention was drawn because of the presence of the pictures, mainly Freud-like iconography…

L.G.

But I hate Freud. From all his introduction to the psychoanalysis only the particular chapter about the mistakingly performed activities was interesting; the other ones were boring to death, confusing and without any meaningfull content. I suppose that only Dali used these infertile theories and sometimes I have the feeling that this psychoanalysis was introduced especially for Dali to allow him to create his paranoid-critic method of working. Apart from that, it hasn’t got any deeper sense, in my drawings there are no allusions to Freud’s theory.

H.A.

And what about drawers?

L.G.

Drawers? And is the catalogue from furniture shop also a hidden erotic allusion? If somebody buys a frying pan is he/she showing his/hers double sexual preferences? According to Freud, this frying pan can symbolise both female and male values. When buying a frying pan, are we going to fry eggs? And eggs also can be treated in such a way as and so on and so forth. It can be continued almost to any extent. At the same time it is the main advantage of the Freud’s theory, because everything can be interpreted in mainy ways, just like everybody wants. And I think that’s why this mixture of ideas was widely acclaimed in America where need for filling people’s mind with tawdriness is never satisfied. Drawers and other potentially erotic elements have nothing to do with Freud, the connection is of another matter, simply direct, usually without any Freud-like ideas. Of course, if anyone wants it so badly – let it be, I don’t care, let’s everybody imagine what they want, I am not to impose any restrictions on that. Apart from that, taking off all the clothes from any work is, as I think, useless. What is vital is the overall impression, everything remaining is like a shit, completely unnecessary.

H.A.

Did you resign form oil painting, didn’t you? What was the reason for doing it?

L.G.

Oil painting has big disadvantages which in a large scale limit creative power. In other words, scarcely does anyone want to rent a room for such an activity, because, as it is widely said, such an artist is of course a drunkard, a drunk-addict, a rake or just a pervert, so potential orgies causing everybody’s indignation are to be taken into account. Then, when this painter is working, he obviously will make a mess, he won’t pay a rent – and what the priest would say about his sinister acitivties? Apart from that, if he is successful, it is also very expensive. General income from creating works of art don’t make up for expenses, so it’s no business at all. Moreover, the easel painting is inevitably a dirty job. In my case, painting a picture seemed to be an almost infinite process, I was constantly correcting, changing and re-arranging many elements; it was so difficult to bring the painting to an end, I was literally atttacked by new and strange ideas and so on. That’s why I decided to give it up and start making less elaborate forms, which can be created in the strict and precise period of time. In this case, I have the final effect after a few minutes and it’s what I was crazy about. I desperately wanted to catch and paint many varoius states of my psyche, without any superfluous combinations and streams of thoughts.

H.A.

And did you manage to do it?

L.G.

Yes, I am quite content about the results.

H.A.

Only you?

L.G.

Well, me, maybe two or three more people, but this number satisfies me.

H.A.

Do you have any specific plans for the future?

L.G.

Of course. I want to live still, then get older and older and finally die. Some time ago, I wanted to be Linda Evans, but this time has passed away and that dream has vanished.

H.A.

Thank you for the nice talk.

L.G.

Thanks, it’s a trifle, 300 zł is to pay…

The text was compilated by: Aurelian Maximus Ossowiecki and Comrade Abramowski. Translated into English by Nightshade.