40 new K-dron works for 40th Anniversary of Polish & Slavic Center
When:
Thursday, November 29, 2012, 7PM
Where:
Polish Slavic Center
177 Kent Street (b/w Manhattan Ave & McGuinness Blvd)
Brooklyn, NY 11222
Exhibition by Janusz Kapusta titled 40 new K-dron works for 40th Anniversary of Polish & Slavic Center
The exhibition is a continuation of the doctoral exhibition at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw and at the Gershwin Hotel in New York City. All presented works derive from K-dron, new geometrical shape discovered by Janusz Kapusta in 1985. The exhibition is devoted to astonishing property of K-dron in which 4 black and 4 white K-drons generate 38,416 pattern combinations. Series of sketches will be presented as a documentation of Janusz Kapusta’s research on K-dron.
Janusz Kapusta, Ph.D.
Dr. Janusz Kapusta was born in Zalesie, Poland, in 1951.
He graduated from the high school of Fine Arts in Poznan and from the Department of Architecture at the Warsaw Polytechnic. Additionally, he studied the History of Philosophy at the Academy of Catholic Theology in Warsaw. In 2010, Dr. Janusz Kapusta received his doctorate in Fine Arts from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Poland.
Dr. Kapusta is an artist interested in Mathematics and Philosophy. His work ranges from small graphic forms, posters, magazine illustrations, graphic design, book illustrations, to set designs and painting. Since 1981, Dr. Kapusta has been living in New York and his works appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Nature and others. He also contributed illustrations for The Captive Mind, published by The Limited Edition Club (1984), a book by the famous Polish writer and Nobel laureate Czeslaw Milosz. The artist’s works can be found in the collections of many museums and galleries around the world (among others: Museum of Modern Art in New York, Museum of Modern Art in Lodz, IBM Collection). He has had many individual exhibitions and participated in numerous group shows.
In 1985, Janusz Kapusta discovered a new geometrical shape - an eleven faced polyhedron, which he called the K-dron (www.k-dron.com). In 1995 he designed the sets for Robert Wilson’s opera The Black Rider, produced in Heilbronn (Germany), and for George Bizet’s Carmen at the Grand Theater in Warsaw. In 1998, he designed the set for The Midsummer Night’s Dream, also shown in Heilbronn. Dr. Janusz Kapusta is the author of three books: Almost Everybody (1985) published by William Morrow in New York, Janusz Kapusta w New York Times (1995) published by WAiF and Ars Polona in Warsaw, (book was later recognized as the most beautiful art album published in Poland that year) and K-dron. Opatentowana nieskonczonosc (K-dron. Patented Infinity) (1995) published by WSiP in Warsaw. In 1998, Dr. Kapusta won the prestigious Alfred Jurzykowski Award in Fine Arts. In 1999, the exhibitions entirely devoted to K-Dron opened at the Museum of Modern Art in Lodz, Poland. At the same time the Actor and Puppet Theater in Katowice, Poland staged a play called Planet K-Dron, the Mystery of Interrupted Journey Dr. Kapusta being the author, set designer and director.
In 2000, the artist discovered new, earlier unknown principles of the golden proportion and presented them at mathematical conferences in American Universities. His articles have appeared in math periodicals in the United States and Japan. In February 2002, Dr. Kapusta accompanied by director Lech Majewski and his wife Maria Katarzyna Szarlat, the costume designer, took part in the staging of Carmen at the National Opera in Vilnius, Lithuania. In the same year, Dr. Kapusta, as one of 22 world artists, was invited to participate in the International Exhibition in Zagreb, Croatia in order to restore the Museum of Art in Vukovar that had been destroyed during the war.
In May 2004, Dr. Kapusta won a Grand Prix in an international competition in Ankara commemorating the 80th Anniversary of the Turkish Republic. The following year in Sintra Portugal he won the first prize for the best drawing published in the World a year before and in Tehran, Iran he won the first prize at the Biennale of Press Illustration. His works can be found regularly in a leading polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita from 1995 to the present. As a visiting professor Dr. Kapusta collaborated with the School of Visual Art and New Media in Warsaw.
Dr. Janusz Kapusta is an Artistic Director at The Chopin Society of New York.
He is also a president and founder of K-Dron Universe, Inc.
Quintet Komeda Project
John Bailey –trumpet and fluegelhorn
Krzysztof Medyna – tenor and soprano saxophone
Andrzej Winnicki – piano
Don Falzone – bass
Michel Winnicki – drums
John Bailey
John Bailey is a virtuoso trumpet player and masterful jazz improviser whose style is “deeply rooted in the legacy of jazz trumpet while adventuresome and intensely lyrical.” In 1996 John was touring the World with Ray Charle. In 1997 John began a six year tenure with Ray Barretto’s New World Spirit. This collaboration led to several international tours, recordings and performances on virtually every jazz stage in Europe and the U.S. His recordings with Barretto include “Portraits in Jazz and Clave” with Joe Lovano, Kenny Burrell, Eddie Gomez and Steve Turre, “Trance Dance” with James Moody and “Homage to Art,” a tribute to Art Blakey featuring John as soloist and composer. Other performance and recording credits include The Buddy Rich Band, The Woody Herman Orchestra, Gloria Estefan, The Florida Philharmonic, The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra, Frank Sinatra Jr., and The Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra. John holds a BM in classical trumpet from The Eastman School of Music and a MM in Studio Music & Jazz from The University of Miami. He frequently appears as a guest artist/clinician at Universities, Jazz Festivals and workshops throughout the World.
Andrzej Winnicki and Krzysztof Medyna
Born and raised in Poland, founders of the Komeda Project, pianist Andrzej Winnicki and saxophonist Krzysztof Medyna have been playing together for over thirty years. They bring both a European classicism and melancholy Slavic melodism to music that’s heavily refracted through the prism of the American tradition. Before moving to the United States in the late 1980s, they spent years touring Europe with the award-winning group Breakwater. Medyna was also a member of In/Formation, which featured Michael Urbaniak alum Czeslaw Bartkowski on drums, touring extensively on double bills with ECM recording artist/Polish trumpet legend Tomasz Stanko. After releasing In the Bush in 2001, with a reformed Electric Breakwater that also featured bassist Mark Egan and drummer Rodney Holmes, Winnicki and Medyna decided to unplug, forming the all-acoustic Komeda Project in 2004. They released two CD’s: “Crazy Girl” in 2007 and “Requiem” in 2009. For more info visit Komeda Projet’s web site: www.komedaproject.com
Don Falzone
Bassist Don Falzone has been playing professionally for over thirty years. His musical career has been extremely diverse. In 2009 he released “Stand Clear of the Closing Doors”, his debut CD of original compositions. It features Donny McCaslin, Adam Rogers, Eric Halvorson, Bruce Saunders, Maucha Adnet and Vana Gierig. In 2011 he followed with his second CD entitled “August Quartet” with John Hart, Jed Levy and Eric Halvorson. In 1997 Don toured with Madeline Peyroux, performing at many jazz festivals including the Montreux Jazz Festival, the North Sea Jazz Festival, The Vancouver and the Montreal Jazz Festivals. He can be heard on the motion picture soundtracks “Fire Walk With Me”, “Primary Colors”, “Until The End Of The World”, “The Steppford Wives”, “Blaze”, and “Sea of Love”. Don Falzone has performed, toured or recorded with many other great artists including Dave Alvin, Marianne Faithful, Leni Stern, David Lindley, Ry Cooder, Tom Waits, Victoria Williams, Bo Diddley, Marc Ribot, David Lynch, Syd Straw, Jewel, Robin Holcomb, Howard Levy, to name a few.
Michael Winnicki
Michael Winnicki is an up and coming New Jersey based drummer and percussionist. He learned music early on, picking up the violin at age 6, and began playing drumset at age 8. He currently studies with jazz legend Victor Lewis (Woody Shaw/Dexter Gordon). Michael also studied classical percussion with Greg Giannascoli (NJCU/Julliard Prep) and currently studies with 1st call NYC freelancer Joe Tompkins (NYC Ballet/NY Phillharmonic). Michael is a third year student at Rutgers University as the first double performance major in both jazz and classical in the history of the school. Michael has various performance experience playing with various Rutgers Ensembles, Plainfield Symphony Orchestra, Bravura Philharmonic, Komeda Project, Symphony Novella and New Jersey Youth Symphony through which he made his Carnegie Hall debut at age 17. Through playing with Komeda Project (tribute quintet to the great Polish film composer Krszysztof Komeda) he has had the oppurtunity to perform along side many great jazz musicians scene such as Jeremy Pelt, Adam Baldych, Russ Johnson, Charles Tolliver, Michael Richmond among others.