the talking bear

It's time for...

The following months are showing to be pretty full, not just from a personal point of view, but from a professional one also. Most changes will happen on the radio front, as I hope to be hosting my own show from July on the Polish Radio External Service, which (I have been told, at any rate) will also be broadcasting on FM in Warsaw and then throughout Poland in the near future (that means within a year or so probably...). Of course I shall be keeping you all up to date with that front. Also: teaching at TEU until the end of the semester, and then... Another year? Ah yes, and the translation business at Wagony Świdnica. Thank God for automobiles (even if they are quite agèd). I'm going to find out how much travelling around Poland I can take over the next few months. It should be exciting, and I'm looking forward to it, as long as I get paid (harshly materialistic I know, but...).

I think a redrafting of the CV will be in order before too long...

For now though, it's time for...

International Print Triennial - II

A longer package for the 'Focus' magazine on Radio Polonia. News on the IPT and also a discussion on new methods of graphic art and Polish print abroad. Aired Radio Polonia 21.09.2006.

Read on for the transcript, or if you're not feeling up to it, download the MP3 here. (7.9 MB)

The International Print Triennial has just kicked off in Poland’s southern city of Kraków. 4500 prints were submitted by 1191 artists for the competition, and out of those, 322 works by 229 artists qualified for the main exhibiton. This the 18th edition of the event, which also turns 40 years old this year.

There is more to this year’s Print Triennial than just the main exhibition though. Professor Witold Skulicz, the president of the International Print Triennial Society in Kraków, explains more:

The programme is huge: there are so many exhibitions that it's almost frightening, and I have to be present at all of them. Please imagine that apart from the main programme, we have created a seperate event, which is organised by the International Print Triennial. 20 galleries in Kraków are taking part in the Graphic Art Days, an event we would like to see becoming an annual fixture in the Cracovian cultural calendar.

Polish graphic art is currently living its great 5 minutes, and I believe that we shouldn't waste them.

Richard Noyce, British art critic, was president of the jury at this year’s Triennial. I asked him about the preparations for the event:

The fact of the matter is that the standard of works submitted this year was incredibly high. I was on the jury again in 2003, and I thought the standard was high then, but this year the standard has surpassed that, it is really an extraordinary high standard on an international scale, so the work of the jury was very difficult indeed. Very challenging, but ultimately very rewarding. The standard of conception is very high, the standard of execution is very high, there’s some amazingly original work, and underneath it all, it’s also very, very accesible.

Ingrid Ledent, an artist from Belgium, won the Grand Prix award this year. I caught up with her before the opening of the main exhibition:

I feel absolutely spoiled, because, well, if you see the quality of the works here, I think there are so many Grand Prix winners here, but it’s me who got it, so I feel absolutely spoiled, I’m so happy.

How are these prints made, are they digital, are they traditional, or is it a mixture of both?

Well, it’s a mixture of both, the main technique is lithography, but it’s combined with digital print. It’s a real traditional litho, even printed on the big stones, so I grain them and it’s the traditional way. But the thing is I make it in a traditional way, but I don’t use it in a traditional way. That’s the thing I try to do.

How do you see the future of graphic art?

Well, I’m very positive, I think with the influence of the new media people start to mix the things, so the traditional way still exists, while I think you can still do things using the traditional graphic methods, which you cannot do with the new media, and vice-versa.

Thank you very much, dank je wel, and many congratulations once again.

Do widzenia!

The International Print Triennial, or IPT, also acts as a forum for graphic art and the direction it is going in. Following on from the previous edition is the debate on digital print, which is becoming more popular as a medium for print-making. Davida Kidd, a Canadian artist who won the IPT Grand Prix award in 2003 and who is also exhibiting her new work this year, gives her opinion on the winner’s entry and on the new techniques being used today:

The standard of art is really high, and it’s interesting because in 2003 there was a lot of digital work and some of the work was very young that you knew there was going to be a change in years to come and that people would have a more sophisticated use for it.

I think it was a really excellent choice. It shows for example just what I was talking about that her work, at first view, it’s very minimal, and you’re not sure what it is, and you find out that underneath some very intricate handwork is a computer-generated image of skin, and the fact that it is computer-generated, or scanned, is really secondary to the fact that what the piece is really about is the traces of time that happen over a human being’s body with skin and scars and wrinkles. She’s taken a photograph of skin, a representation of time, and then she’s done these very very painfully intricate drawings of fine lines done by hand that superimpose over on top of the photograph. So, the drawing is a metaphor for time, the slowness of time passing and all of the traces and lines that happen over time.

It seems that digital print is becoming more important than ever before. But to what extent is it changing the art that is being produced? Richard Noyce again:

There was some controversy at the last Triennial about the gulf between digital work and traditional work, and I expressed that hope, and I have to say I am not a practising printmaking artist, I tend to write about art more than anything else, but I expressed a hope, then, that the gap between the digital world of print and the traditional world of print would disappear. Some people thought that was close to heresy, but now artists are able to choose whatever they like and Ingrid Ledent is a very good case in point, that you can use digital, or traditional lithography, or combine them. And that is the way it has to be. Digital, for me now, is just another technique, it sits with woodcut, wood engraving, etching and lithography, and all the others. It is just another technique, it’s available to artists.

Karen Kunc is a graphic artist from the state of Nebraska in the United States. She is having an exhibition as part of the International Print Triennial, and it seems that this isn’t the first time she’s been to Poland:

This isn’t your first time in Kraków, you’ve been involved with the Kraków Triennial for a while, what’s the history behind it?

Well, I do have a wonderful long relationship with Kraków from 20 years, when I visited the first time as a guest to give lectures in Poland, I was in Warsaw and Kraków, and did alecture about my work, and I was very young at the time, so it was a learning experience about how to explain my work and I met so many Polish artists that became life-long friends, but then it took 15 years before I came back for Triennial in 2000, and then I also came back to teach at the Academy (of Fine Arts) in 2002, I believe. It was wonderful to come back and continue meeting people, I’ve followed the development of so many of these Polish artists that I met, for all of this time, and had an exhibition in the United States that I organised of Polish artists, so that was very important too, so I think there’s an emotional connection from our long history together.

The International Print Triennial is truly a feast for lovers of graphic art and printmaking. There is so much on offer, that it looks as if every building in the Old Town of Kraków has turned into a gallery for the occasion. The IPT has also signed an agreement with two other galleries to turn the Triennial into a truly international affair. The Horst-Janssen Musuem in Oldenburg, Germany, and the Kunstlerhaus in Vienna, Austria, will be exhibiting works that were submitted, although chosen by their own juries.

International Print Biennial from 1966; International Print Triennial since 1991. Has the brainchild of Professor Skulicz finally come of age? With forty years at the helm of printmaking in Kraków, we shall see in three years time when the Triennial comes round again.

International Print Triennial - I

News item for the International Print Triennial in Kraków. Account of the opening of the IPT: amazing graphic art! Aired on Radio Polonia 18.09.2006.

Read on for the transcript. MP3 can be downloaded here. (3.3 MB)

The International Print Triennial has kicked off in Poland’s southern city of Kraków. Graphic artists sent 4500 prints to the jury for the event, and from that 322 prints by 229 artists have been selected for the main exhibition of the Print Triennial. The 18th edition of the International Print Triennial also marks the event’s 40th anniversary this year, and the public is being promised a spectacular array of exhibitions by printmakers and artists from around the globe. Professor Witold Skulicz, president of the International Print Triennial Society, has no time to rest on his laurels, though:

The programme is huge: there are so many exhibitions that it's almost frightening, and I have to be present at all of them. Please imagine that apart from the main programme, we have created a seperate event, which is organised by the International Print Triennial. 20 galleries in Kraków are taking part in the Graphic Art Days, an event we would like to see becoming an annual fixture in the Cracovian cultural calendar.

Polish graphic art is currently living its great 5 minutes, and I believe that we shouldn't waste them.

Richard Noyce, British art critic, was president of the jury at this year’s Triennial. I asked him about the preparations for the event:

The fact of the matter is that the standard of works submitted this year was incredibly high. I was on the jury again in 2003, and I thought the standard was high then, but this year the standard has surpassed that, it is really an extraordinary high standard on an international scale, so the work of the jury was very difficult indeed. Very challenging, but ultimately very rewarding. The standard of conception is very high, the standard of execution is very high, there’s some amazingly original work, and underneath it all, it’s also very, very accesible.

The Grand Prix was awarded to Ingrid Ledent, an artist from Belgium who has exhibited at the Triennial before. She won with a series entitled ‘A Self-accomplishing Fact’, which was produced using a hybrid technique of digital and lithography printing:

I feel absolutely spoiled, because, well, if you see the quality of the works here, I think there are so many Grand Prix winners here, but it’s me who got it, so I feel absolutely spoiled, I’m so happy.

One of the artists to get a statutory award was Iwona Abrams, a Polish artist who has been living in the UK for the past couple of decades:

I have graduated from printmaking in 1987 in Poland, then I moved to England, where I studied at the St. Martin’s School of Art and the Royal College of Art. Print was always a very natural wasy of working for me. The Printmaking Triennial in Kraków is an absolute treat for us artists. It’s one of the few remaining… I would say it’s just a celebration of the links that people establish through this kind of event, incredibly important.

The International Print Triennial in Kraków invites you to see some of the most interesting graphic art that is being produced today, and has events running until the end of November, not only in Kraków, but also in other towns across Poland.

6 Month Update

You wouldn't have thought that after nearly 6 months of absence (ab-sense?) I would have bothered to update my blog. I feel it a kind of duty. I owe it to a lot of people. I may even owe it to myself. I dunno.

The last six months, and in fact this whole year, has taught me so much about what is real and what is not; what is truth (or something that resembles it), and what are porky-pies, or just plain bullshit. I suppose such emotional conflicts are something that every person has, more or less. But let us not dwell on emotion for too long, as there are things to be told.

I am still an MA student. Although at this point in time I rather I weren't. Last semester I attended class, of course, but there wasn't enough of it.

I worked as an intern at Kraków's International Print Triennial. I was supposed to learn something useful, like do a bit of PR or something. I translated instead. Oh, how I translated. Now I know this blog is about my profession also. But this was incredible. I started to figure out that I was not cut out to be a full-time translator. Nevertheless, I finished the internship after three months (the time alloted by the university), and found myself with a few translations coming in, either from the Print Triennial or from the Bunkier Sztuki, the contemporary art museum. And of course some students keeping up appearances from time to time. I trained one in English for his matura exam. My next-door neighbour's grand-son. No pressure there, then. Luckily he passed. And they say A-levels are getting easy in the UK...

I went on holiday to Italy. Beautiful. I went by train from Poland. It took me forever, because the Italians decided to strike on my ass the day I decided to travel. So I spent 14 hours in Villach, a very picturesque Austrian Alpine town on the border with Tarvisio. The way back was adventurous too, as precision Italian timekeeping, this time, made me run across Vienna station half-naked to catch my ongoing connection to Kraków. But that's really by-the-by. It was fun.

When I got back from Italy I got busy answering the phone. And making calls too. The last two months have done their business. And I've done mine. I have got two new jobs which ideally sit together side by side. At least with the timetable that I have been given. I am now a lektor at a local (Cracovian) private Catholic university, the Tischner European University (Wyższa Szkoła Europejska), teaching English as a foreign language (natch) but also a practical module for the Applied Linguistics course at the university. All pretty cool. Then a month after that I had an (job) interview at Radio Polonia, the English section of Polskie Radio's external service. Two days later I was in the studio reading the news lajw to a global audience. I got my microphone, and am now their correspondent in Kraków.

All this, and of course more. My company has finally started up. Funnily enough, it's called The Talking Bear. And I deal in translation, foreign-language teaching, and advertising. Yes, you did just read that... I have my own stamp, and what is more my very own accountant. Well, I would like to see any of you try to understand Polish tax law!

Of course, not everything is OK all of the time. My mother's best friend Zyta died just before I went to Italy. She was in a coma for about a month. So sad when shit like this happens. She was with us on our holidays in Italy last year, and I, too, have known her for my fare share of time. She accompanied me with her husband Marek on the drive down to the Abruzzo, and lay on the back seat telling us funny stories and engaging in awesome discussion, whether it was about caffè coretto or Florentine architecture. RIP, Zyta. You were truly great.

And then comes today. I'm sitting at home with a cold and a temperature. Translations from the aforesaid institutions never seem to cease, and of course I'm a little fed up with it all. And then a message: Carmen nie żyje. Carmen was a stray dog (bitch) that hung around our house in the Abruzzo. Her full given name was Carmencita (by the people who looked after the house), and she was very friendly, always hungry and extremely playful. Mum got her inoculations done, got her an Italian pet passport and while I was driving with Marek and Zyta back to Warsaw, Mum and Carmen went to Rome and attended the Angelus on St. Peter's Square. Carmen even had her own seat on the plane on the flight back. However, we knew that she was ill. It wasn't long before she became weak, not helped by last winter, with no doubt. Always cheeky and cheerful, Carmen was great company for us, and for the other three dogs in Warsaw.

In the Wawel choir too, two people have died so far this year. One bass and a second tenor.

How brittle life is: such is the way we are made, alas.

To finish for now - one thing that I have realised is this: you can't have your cake and eat it. But you can nibble at someone else's. (That's love.)

I don't know when I'll next post. The best way to listen to what I am doing is here. In fact I might even start taking my radio podcasts that I file with Radio Polonia and upload them here. Perhaps with a bit of off-the-air commentary?

Love you all, M

PS No, I haven't finished my MA. But I will. Promise.

A Picture Tells A Thousand Words

Life has taken it's toll recently. However, I thought I should at least make an effort to write something. I wonder how many of my blog posts now introduce themselves with such lame excuses. Answers on a SAE to me...

I have realised that many of my photos on Flickr are translated into Polish (by myself, natch). With this in mind, I have started up a set with some pictures with a bilingual title or have bilingual elements in them (in the notes, for instance). This is to show Brits how to make steak tatare the proper way, and likewise to show Poles what Brits keep in their larders. A photographic method not just to show language differences, but also cultural ones (hehe).

Just a Regular Tuesday

Taught at school this morning - as per usual, only four people turned up for class: end of term laziness and general getting-out-of-bed trouble. After four days of a massive heatwave (winds straight from the Sahara, temperatures in the high 30s), it finally started to rain. Which is OK...

Have to begun to love Polish daytime television. TVN is especially good on this front: Nash Bridges followed by Northern Exposure. You just can't beat it, and it makes the ironing go by that much faster (5 shirts, 6 T-shirts and 2 pairs of trousers, FYI...)

Waiting myself for the end of the semester and a decent translation job to keep me in pocket throughout the summer. Anyone got anything they want translated from Polish into English?

Over and Out.

Cracovian Architecture &c.

May week-end a success. The sun in the Beskid Żywiecki was particularly awesome, resulting in mild sunburn...

Of course, to make up for two lost days students decided to pile it in before the week was up, making me go ever so slightly mad. What one does in the name of a few złoty, I tell you. To really finish me off, I've sung every day since I got back, too. Being in two choirs is good fun, but when you have to sing endlessly it does become somewhat tiring. Practice on Weds with Olim Pueri Cantantes, Thursday Mass on Św. Krzyża (Church of the Holy Cross), Friday practice with the Cathedral and Cecylian Choirs, today a break, but tomorrow... Tomorrow is St. Stanislaus' day (Św. Stanisław), patron saint of Poland. The Mass on the Skałka is going to be televised. My boots are trembling.

Apart from running around like a total madman, I have also set up a photoset in Flickr of interesting buildings and architecture in Kraków. The set doesn't have many pictures now, but I'll soon rectify the situation. There's a lot to see, and some of the most beautiful buildings are hidden in the maze that is the Old Town. You can see for yourself here.

And one last thing. The election in the UK. I voted (by proxy). I wasted more paper for a vote that wasn't going to make a difference anyway. Time for PR in the UK? I should think so...

Anyway, in light of tomorrow, here is are the first two verses of the hymn written in memory of St Stanisław, Bishop of Kraków, who was "hacked to pieces" in 1078 by Bolesław II...

Gaude Mater Polonia
Prole foecunda nobili
Summi Regis magnalia
Laude frequenta vigili

Cuius benigna gratia
Stanislai Pontificis
Passionis insignia
Signis fulgent mirificis

Until the next time...

How not to teach grammar...

I have been teaching English as a tutor for little under three years (with a breal in between), and as a bona-fide CELTA qualified beak for the past month. Not necessarily a career move, I hasten to add, but at least a profession that pays the bills and leaves a little left over for those finer moments in life (coffee on the Rynek, 50 grams of Żurawinówka at the Lokal, and sometimes the pictures with my sweetness).

Books that frighten students

However, there is one part of English teaching that is most challenging: grammar. Teachers don't like teaching it (well, I don't particularly) and students above all couldn't give a monkey's about the virtues of the past simple or a type 3 conditional.

One thing I have also realised is that it doesn't matter who you teach; whether it be the owner of a restaurant, a PhD student studying history, or even a priest. The answer to the question: "So what would you like to take away from our lessons together", is often answered with a wish to be able to speak English (vaguely) fluently about subjects that interest them. And yes indeed, the topics vary dramatically, from the problems facing the contemporary Polish film industry to Italian cuisine &c. &c.

The question of grammar goes out of the window. Not only do students think it's a waste of time, they positively cringe at the idea of having to learn it in the first place. My point is bolstered by a conversation (in Polish, before people start telling me I can't speak English properly) I had recently with a prospective pupil of mine (he shall remain anonymous, as he's quite a decent chap, really). An exerpt (as far as I can remember...):

Me: "OK, and what exactly do you want to learn?"

Student: "Oh, I dunno, just need to be able to speak English proper."

Me: "So I suppose we'll be having to do some grammar then."

Student: "Well, you can teach me grammar, but don't expect me to learn any of it."

Quite. My bad for even mentioning grammar in the first place. I'll just have to sneak it in at some point or other. Maybe after a few years I'll be able to make grammar:

1) exciting

2) fun

3) look tempting (without the use of bribes)

Until then, well, we'll see.

Święta, Święta, i po Świętach...

Back in Krak after Easter nosh and booze and rejoicing in Warszawa. All satis, needless to say.

The Easter break started promisingly with a beer and a kotlet schabowy (breaded pork cutlet - the only thing not Wiener about it was the lack of lemming) in the restaurant car last Wednesday.

Classic WARS design (WARS being short for Wagony Restauracyjne i Sypialne, [Restaurant and Sleeping Cars] I think...)

The Triduum was a time for reflection, hope, sadness and joy all mixed into one... The Varsovian nights were especially beautiful: we had fog on Good Friday and clear skies on others. Some rather good pics. No rifleshots from the local military base at 6am on Easter Sunday, though. I think that's the first time I've ever managed to sleep beyond that time in Warsaw on that day...

Have started my stint at IH with a couple of classes yesterday. All jolly good fun. However, will be taking next week off as am going to Frankfurt for the Musikmesse. Of course, I will have much to write about after I get back. For now, I'm thinking about different teaching methodologies and the best way to tell students that even though you shouldn't use present continuous with stative verbs, everyone does. I blame McDonald's. If they hadn't had started their "I'm lovin' it" campaign, life would be a lot easier.

Time for lunch. And prayers for the Pope.

Monday Monday - how iconic...

Time for a post... Apart from adding that I am now a qualified teacher (Pass B), have caught up on my sleep and eradicated all signs of CELTA syndrome (see previous posts), I am now getting ready for the Easter break.

Last week I attended the 5th Symposium on Iconicity in Language and Literature - my fiancée gave a corker of a presentation on naming objects (with reference to industrial design) and their respective iconic properties. I've never heard the word 'iconic' or 'iconoclastic' used so much in my life - everything in its own little way seems to have some iconicity built in to it. My laptop (which is now repaired) is something of an iconic figure: it rests in the middle of my desk and everything that surrounds it seems to be of less importance (apart from this month's phone bill...). To look at its keyboard presents one with yet another iconic image - the space bar. By far the biggest key on any board, yet it is used to signify nothing; a void; Ø; a space. How iconic is that? Ultimately this void-space is, in fact, as important as the clusters of 'language' that surround it, whether it be written language or spoken. So important indeed, that when doing a translation from one language into another, spaces are included in the character count (thus 1800 characters including spaces). A mighty linguistic and iconic phenomenon, to be sure.

This 'zeroist' (not nihilist...) approach to language might also work when teaching a language: English, for instance. Indeed, during the conference I met a New Zealander from Florence who has written an English primer (although quite advanced), and yet it has no tables or commands. It does have pictures, a story which is divied up into 14 chapters, and it relies solely on students' emotional intelligence to think about the language they are being exposed to and learn it through emotion and feeling. The 'Ø' in all this is to try and make students think for themselves whilst absorbing the language that surrounds them - the teacher should merely be a guide and not necessarily just a taskmaster. An idea for my IH (International House) classes which I take on after Easter (surely the most iconic celebration in the Christian calendar)...

With Easter Wishes. Z życzeniami na Wesołych Świąt.