Teraz Poliż is the first Polish professional women’s theatre. Together with the director and composer Wojciech Blecharz, who is considered one of the most interesting representatives of the younger generation, they theatrically tame Kazimierz Malewicz’s Black Square in an interactive performance-concert based on the drama by Anna Świrszczyńska.

The origins of one of the most important works in the history of art have their roots in music, as it were, in the futuristic Russian opera Victory over the Sun by Mikhail Matyushin from 1913. The set design for this opera was designed by Kazimierz Malewicz and it is here that you can look for the origins of the famous Black Square on a White Background (1915), described by the author as the “zero point” in the history of art, “the experience of pure objectlessness in white liberated nothingness”. The work gave rise to “suprematism”, a Russian art movement focused on basic geometric forms such as circles, squares, lines and rectangles, painted in a limited range of colors. The objectlessness mentioned by Malevich does not, however, refer to abstraction, but to a kind of spirituality, contemplation of the absolute.

For Malevich, the black square becomes a “messenger of the gods”, in a one-act play by Anna Świrszczyńska it is something indefinite / impossible, giving life and death, it is the realization of the absurd.

The author notes in her art that absurdity is needed in order to survive or at least face reality. He suggests that happiness is the essence of existence, the border between life and death, and that laughter may be the perfect vaccine with a beneficial influence on the perception of reality, although its side effects are not fully known.

The authors worked on the first version of the performance in 2018, and the absurdity of Świrszczyńska’s text was, in a way, a remedy, an antidote to reality. Only three years later, the absurdity of the social and political situation in Poland has gone so far that there is no more laughter that there is nothing to laugh at. Instead of vapors of absurdity, we need black masses, invoking a new “messenger of the goddesses”, maybe his / her coming will allow us to renew the face of this earth full of hatred, homophobia, exclusion, dehumanization and zones free from LGBT “ideology”.

– The form of the concert is derived from the original version that opened the stage – says Wojtek Blecharz, director and composer. – It was the first time that I used the preparation of electronic instrument keys. The absurdity of this technique is partly derived from the spirit of Świrszczyńska’s text, but also in a perverse way refers to the beginnings of electronic music, to pieces for instrument and tape. This is how the Sonata for keyboard and tape was created, which eventually became an autonomous piece of music.

In the current version, you will hear its first and second parts. Sonata for keyboard and tape is a piece of long duration that can be performed by any number of performers, on any number of instruments, it is a kind of new ambient piece, a sound “sculpture”, to be performed by any kind of musician, regardless of his previous experience musical. In Italian, suonare means to play, to sound, to perform.

Anna Świrszczyńska notes in her art Black Square the fact that absurdity is needed in order to survive or at least face reality. The author suggests that happiness is the essence of existence, the border between life and death, and laughter can be an ideal vaccine with a salutary influence on the perception of reality, although its side effects are not fully known …