Wilhelm Sasnal

Born in 1972, Tarnow, Poland

Lives and works in Tarnow, Poland

Drawing images from sources as diverse as art history, 20th century propaganda icons, advertising, photojournalism and his own snapshots, Wilhelm Sasnal uses painting to challenge traditional expectations of representation and perception. Sasnal pares his images down to their barest essentials, distorting his subjects and estranging them from their original contexts through his own personal filter and as such deconstructing hierarchies and blurring distinctions between private and public.

Untitled (2011), one of the works in The Arts Club, is based on a photo taken by Sasnal during his travels in that year. A rag hangs from the gasoline tank of a white van. It’s a striking image in its ambiguity. Married with a lit match, a rag in a gas tan can equal a car bomb, although the truth may equally be something far more banal. Sasnal plays with the tension of his image, evoking political overtones without making them explicit.

Sasnal has had solo shows at such museums as the Whitechapel Gallery, London and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.