Beata Czapska is an artist sculptor
She was born in Warsaw in aristocratic family.
However it's hard to learn that from her, because she is extremely modest.
She graduated Architecture at the Silesian University of Technology
Since 1974 she live in Paris,
where she was learning to sculpt in legendary sculptor René Coutelle's atelier.
Beata Czapska's works has been exhibited in many prestigious art galleries
and museum all over the world.
And now also in Limited Edition Gallery.
We are now in your family home in Mokotów, Warsaw,
which has a very interesting history.
Yes, but I wasn't born here.
Our house, my parents' apartment, was seized by other tenants after the war.
When my parents came to Warsaw, it was already occupied and there was no way to live there.
We moved here as late as in 1957-1958.
This building was burned during the war, as the guerrillas defended themselves here.
It used to be a luxury house; even the caretaker had the pre-war manners.
My mother used to tell me – obviously, I couldn't remember it myself –
that there was a red carpet and a wooden staircase here.
Of course, it all burned during the war.
It was here where I went to primary school,
not too near, on Różana Street, near Kazimierzowska,
because there were no places at the nearest school.
Then I went to high school
and had lived here until I went to college.
My parents ran a very lively social life.
They loved it; in general it was an open house.
Once a month, 20-30 people would come to a party,
where everybody where rather standing than sitting.
There was a buffet and various people would come:
the engineers, of course, because my father was a construction engineer,
he built bridges and roads;
and my mother was an architect,
so most of the engineers came,
but also writers, poets and painters. The company was diverse.
Obviously, besides, all the time somebody was coming for a lunch or dinner,
so there was quite a crowd.
We were all meeting for a lunch at 4 pm,
and then there was dinner.
These were the two meals we shared together.
At these meals, there were turbulent discussions,
of course political,
but also a lot of talking about art.
My mother and also my father were very interested in painting and sculpture.
And that was actually part of my education.
This place, it was all covered with books.
There were a few thousand books
and papers, because my parents worked scientifically.
My father even used to write some reportage articles;
for example, he published a whole series about
architects and construction engineers.
He was the initiator of the biographical dictionary of Polish engineers.
My mom also wrote articles
on the preservation of monuments to various magazines,
because she was a conservation specialist.
She worked in the Architecture Department
and as a conservator.
I understand that you got your love for architecture from your mom probably, right?
Did she have the biggest influence on your decisions?
My mom was rather involved in the history of architecture
and restoration of monuments;
she didn't deal with designing at all.
My father was more into design,
he was a builder, who elaborated constructions for new buildings.
Of course, he also made expertise of old buildings,
but his main task was to establish the endurance
of structures of buildings designed by an architect.
I'm not sure,
but probably one of the reasons why I liked architecture,
was the Faculty of Architecture in Warsaw on Koszykowa Street.
To the date, it's a pretty, fascinating
building in the Art Nouveau style.
With all the drawings that used to hang on walls
from the drawing department and also some projects,
this building indeed had something fascinating in itself.
I grew up in this department
as my mom was taking me up there all the time.
I knew everybody from the faculty.
It seems to me
that this building was the one that made me so fascinated with architecture.
Architectural studies were very interesting
because all the classes involved creativity.
Apart from the political economy, which was a nightmare,
and descriptive geometry,
which was terrible – because we had a very weak lecturer –
besides these two,
all the subjects were very interesting.
How did it happen that
after the studies you went to Paris?
I was raised in the French culture:
my mother always went to Paris
and I knew French literature well.
I finished my discharge
and I graduated from the university
with one exception that, at that time,
there was no graduation certificate
and it was combined with the diploma.
At one point I thought that,
before the diploma defense,
I had to leave,
because after graduation it would be impossible.
One had to work for five years before leaving the country.
Either you had to pay for your polytechnic studies and only then could you leave,
or you had to work for five years.
When you eventually decided to stay in Paris
and you started working with your husband,
you created some quite interesting projects.
With my husband, we were doing the so-called "housing" (residential sector)
I learned so much from him.
He was much older than me, though he didn't look older at all.
When I met him, I didn't think he was seventeen years older than me!
He looked very young
and had a lot of experience in "housing".
At the previous company, with Émile Aillaud,
they also had been doing a lot of "housing".
This is just such a little, ungrateful part of architecture,
because it isn't spectacular,
although it's very interesting.
Then, after the divorce,
I worked in various architecture studios.
I was doing projects in Africa,
for Félix Houphouët-Boigny
for the Ivory Coast.
In this studio, I worked for six months.
I got a contract to decorate the Party's House of Félix Houphouët-Boigny
corridors, offices,
and at the same time
– as we finished these projects early –
I got another commission to design two hotels on Azores.
The hotels' skeletons stood there,
and they needed to be repaired and arranged.
It was the time when I worked with the decorator,
and he taught me how to design interiors.
It was an interesting job for me.
Later I worked for the studio
where we were doing ski stations.
The office where I was working made most of the ski stations in the Alps.
During your work as an architect
you designed bigger sculptural objects
such as fountains.
I started working with an American sculptor
and I was designing the fountain you have mentioned with him.
He engaged me in the project of his villa in Majorca.
It was Coutelle's acquaintance,
whom I met in the late 1980s.
When he was visiting his friends,
he was always taking me with him,
and so I met Michael Prentice.
His mother's maiden name was Rockefeller, so it was a very rich family.
Prentice had a large atelier in Paris
and just bought a square in Majorca.
There was a ruin standing there,
and we built a villa on this ruin
– even without a building permit, it was built very quickly.
And then, as we finished the villa,
I made various decorations with him.
Once we made a fountain near La Défense, another time the interiors,
and yet another time we designed the business premises,
even the furniture and lighting.
It was quite an interesting job
and I learned a lot.
And how did your path towards sculpture look like?
You have mentioned before that it was sculpture who came to you.
Well, you can say that sculpture somehow followed me.
At the university, during the second year, we had sculpture classes,
for one semester.
However, as I was working as a model,
I had less time to study,
so I skipped the classes
that were less important.
And the sculpture I completely let it go.
I came at the end of the semester
to the teacher
and he, instead of throwing me out
(because he didn't even see me through the whole semester), said:
everyone is making a portrait, so you'll make yourself a self-portrait.
He gave me a bucket of clay,
stuck a mirror there, and occasionally came
to make adjustments.
He said: "Now I can give you a C,
but if you cast it in a plaster, I'll give you a higher note."
And I said that the C was enough for me,
because I also had some other subjects
with which I was in trouble.
After some time, Stanisław Słodowy,
who taught me sculpture
and who was professor at the Architecture in Gliwice,
calls me one day.
It was the end of the 1970s;
he says he is in Paris,
where he exhibited his own and his friends' sculptures,
and the gallery sold them
and doesn't want to return the money.
He has an attorney, but he doesn't speak French.
At the time, he arranged a meeting with René Coutell.
It was when I just had left hospital,
divorced my husband
and had thousands of things on my mind.
Each of the Poles had such an impulse then
to help anybody who came from behind the iron curtain.
But I hung up the phone, and thought: what happened to me?
I'm moving, I'm getting divorced, with a two-year-old child,
I just came out of the hospital
and I still deal with the other people's things?
But I have some sense of duty, so as I already agreed,
I went to this meeting.
I came to the studio.
It was very typical.
At that time, most of them were housed
in former craft studios.
These were very long lots,
with a small façade,
and then there were the ateliers,
most of them belonged to craftsmen,
and from time to time the artists occupied them.
And in such a long backyard
Coutelle had his studio as well.
There was an overgrown garden,
and among these plants there were sculptures, older and newer.
Fantastic world:
a table made of a piece of granite,
where we would eat something at noon;
everybody would contribute and bring something to eat.
It was Stanisław Słodowy,
who introduced me to René Coutelle and to his studio where he had his students.
In fact, most of the young generation had come out of his studio.
He was a great educator.
Apart from being a great artist,
he could also teach.
It was my first contact with the studio,
I wasn't particularly into sculpture at the time.
I helped Stanisław, got back all the money and won the case.
I also helped him in the court, I knew him for a long time.
My friendship with Coutelle started with literature.
Sculpture didn't interest me at all.
Literature – it was my passion.
Of course, I read thousands of books,
at least everything that was available in Poland.
When I met Coutelle, I could fill all these gaps
in Poland, for various reasons, political among others, this literature wasn't translated.
So, our friendship started with literature.
He was a poet himself and took an active part in
the English-French poets' organization.
He wrote himself. He was an unbelievable erudite.
And like my father, he had an incredible memory.
he read, but he also remembered.
He remembered the names of the heroes from the books
he had read 40 years earlier.
It was nice that he could introduce me to the literature
that I didn't know before.
It all started with literature and what happened next?
How did it happen that you started sculpting?
It was fascinating that there were diverse people coming to lunches
philosophers, mathematicians, diplomats and writers.
People were coming and discussions were passionate.
I regret very much that I didn't record this.
I worked as an architect, so I didn't have time to come every day.
I was coming on Saturdays.
Everyone always brought or bought something.
Our friendship was growing.
Coutelle was asking me, "when will you start sculpting?"
To please him, when I was unemployed,
they closed the office where I worked, I was visiting him and began to sculpt.
You can't say I didn't like it,
but I would have never thought it would be my primary occupation.
I just did it to please Coutelle
and because of the atmosphere in his studio.
There were always two or three students there, no more.
They worked during a week, but I could come every day. They would work twice a week so it wasn't crowded.
So, I made my first sculpture.
Coutelle gave me a piece of sandstone,
but I didn't like that material.
Then, because I was practicing yoga,
I made such a "yogi," and it's even standing here:
I've fixed it, because it was a little damaged.
However, to tell you the truth, I didn't really think about it at all.
It was only when I divorced my third husband,
and the computers came to the architect's practice,
I couldn't even force myself to look for a job in architecture anymore.
Besides, with my second husband,
we had a carpentry shop so I couldn't handle anything else.
Then, when I divorced him, I had to start earning money.
We had to sell the carpentry,
because it belonged to our partnership company,
and some complications occurred.
I couldn't force myself to deal with architecture.
Coutelle said, "Come and sculpt."
I didn't have any money,
I gave my kid to the nursery,
I got on a bike (I didn't even have money for a subway)
and I was cycling from La Défense.
His studio was at the other end,
so I had to cycle almost through the entire Paris.
I did a total of twenty kilometres twice a day.
When you started sculpting, how did you do this?
Did you already begin with the material, without any models?
Coutelle made me do such tiny models.
To be able to teach me, he needed to lead me.
He had to see how the forms were structured in the stone,
so I was making these tiny models.
But we never made such models as I saw, for example, in Orońsko
where sculptors make plaster model and then translate it into stone in the same scale.
I don't know what is the purpose of it,
I think it's nonsense.
If I made such a big model in plaster,
I wouldn't have any motivation to make it in stone, I would make something else then.
Why making the same thing again?
Apparently, this is the system at the Academy.
I didn't study at the Academy
and I get to know sculptors in Orońsko.
It's pretty great, when you come from a completely different environment.
I suspect that I wouldn't do what I do in sculpture,
if I had finished the Academy.
This wouldn't be the same.
The Polish school of sculpture is very good,
but it exerts quite a big mark on its students.
In fact, everyone was making the so called taille directe,
it means they were forging directly in stone.
This term was created to resist pointing,
the modelling method of creating a model in plaster,
and then transferring it to stone.
Taille directe is like drawing in stone.
I don't make models because it bothers me.
At some point, as I left Coutelle's studio, I didn't make models at all.
He just forced us to make them.
And some people still make them, but it bothered me.
When I lost my studio (I used to have a studio but the owner wanted it back),
I returned to Coutelle for some time.
I was making sculptures there, and Coutelle forced me to create a model once.
And I screwed up the sculpture.
This is the only sculpture that just didn't come out, because of my different approach.
There are sculptors who
have the entire form in their heads exactly as it should look.
They stand before the stone and they do it.
If there are some problems with the stone,
e.g. there are some defects or breakages,
then the only thing they can do is to give up.
Because they stick to what they have come up with.
Whereas I have a general outline of what to do,
but it's not that accurate.
So, it's as you were following the material itself?
Yes, you're right.
Actually, the material shows me the way.
It speaks to me – the stone, as if it was talking to me.
In any case, it's visible –
if you tried to sculpt against the stone, it would be impossible.
I always find a way to sculpt that best fits the piece of stone or wood.
You're known from the fact that you can perfectly match the material
to the form and to the final result,
because you don't sculpt your model as such, but its essence, its quintessence.
What is your secret that it comes out so greatly?
I'm not quite sure if it comes perfectly.
I'm never satisfied with what I do.
But above all, I adhere to what Coutelle taught me,
that is, that the material be matched to what you plan to create.
That is, if someone carves the spread hands,
he won't do it in stone, but in bronze.
Of course, it's possible to do anything
in the 19th century artists even created the sculpted laces.
In Louvre, there're marble laces,
but it's more craft than sculpting.
According to Coutelle, and I agree with him,
the material shall fit the form of the model,
to how it is.
It must have a character.
If the sculpture is compact, the stone endures it perfectly.
You look for human features in your models that usually come from the world of fauna.
And I can see that animals that you sculpt have a very delicate contour.
Usually, they're benign, positive, good.
Do you also see the human being this way?
I'm a natural born optimist and I think
that everyone, even the worst thug, is good on the inside.
Everyone has a positive essence in themselves.
Then, of course, there is the influence of education,
or reincarnation – if one believes that it does exist.
I think the bad in people is an effect of the external influences.
The essence of a human being and of an animal is good.
I'm not interested in depicting evil,
because there is no point in doing so.
What for?
There's plenty of evil everywhere,
so why continue to replicate it in sculpture or painting?
Anyway,
I like only positive art.
It doesn't have to be mindless art though.
I just don't like reflecting evil in art.
I think it's pointless.
In my opinion, art is meant to lift our soul, to give joy,
not contentment, but inner joy.
It shall get us to some other world.
Not to a negative world, but to a positive one.
Why copy the negative one? I don't see the point.
Naturally, there're a lot of artists, who depict the negative world,
and it also plays its role in the society.
Because everything has a function.
Apparently, my mission is to show what is good.
In animals, for example.
Animals have the same feelings as we do,
so there really is no difference.
When you watch animals through telephoto lenses, when you watch movies shot from an aircraft,
you can see the animals' real nature.
Before, the animalistic art
was mostly hunting scenes,
where the animals were furious, bitter, defending themselves.
If someone attacks, they defend themselves.
As if someone attacked me, I would be angry too!
Both humans and animals are aggressive at times when they're in danger,
but nowadays, when you observe lions, giraffes, bisons,
snakes, and spiders using the telephoto lenses,
things look quite different.
. In fact, I don't see any difference between man and animal.
I perceive everything that surrounds us as a whole:
an animal is just one element of it.
This animal is a fragment of the whole.
I always like to depict in animals the feelings that are common for them and humans.
I don't sculpt concrete animals:
when I create a monkey, then it's not a macaque, a chimpanzee or a gorilla.
All the monkey family has some common features.
And they're very strong.
In art, I mean to show these qualities and characteristics.
The exterior is less important
than showing the character appropriate for all the monkeys.
When I sculpt hedgehogs, they're alike,
and there are almost 40 species of hedgehogs!
We don't even realize it.
How many frogs are there? Hundreds of species,
but all have similar features.
And these qualities are defined by the physical structure,
which also influences their character.
I've read several times that from the beginning of your journey with sculpture you strive for pure form.
Sculpture, in general, is the so-called pure form.
Unlike architecture, which is a form, but also plays various functions,
and unlike design that is functional as well.
This definition – pure form – is like a description of sculpture.
Sculpture is the pure form.
It doesn't have any function.
Of course, there are sculptures that have a function,
sculpture itself doesn't have any purpose,
except for the decorative one,
of which I'm not a supporter,
because sculpture is not always a decoration.
For me, the work of art is when I look at it repeatedly
and I constantly discover something new.
But what I discover is something I cannot define.
Such a work of art takes me to a world where
there is neither shape, nor sound, nor colour, and at the same time it's everything at once.
It gives me an incredible inner joy.
This is a work of art for me.
This the way my beloved sculptors influence me
Henry Moore who had an incredible sense of form.
Every time I go to Henry Moore's exhibition,
I go out in a bad mood
because I think I'll never be able to sculpt like him.
But he was amazing, I can't stop looking at his works.
I had the same feeling when I was looking at the Alfons Karny's sculptures.
He also had an incredible sense of form.
He was mainly a portraitist.
I was in the museum in Białystok,
I couldn't leave.
You can see how he understands the form.
This is a formulation that only a sculptor can understand.
You have to sculpt to know it.
Dunikowski, of course, is my beloved sculptor when it comes to Polish artists.
I think he is the best sculptor, of an international reputation.
I think he is even more interesting that Rodin,
who had less spiritual aspect.
Rodin's sculptures were more intellectual.
Brancusi is also quite an interesting sculptor, I like him very much,
but his art is also highly intellectual.
It's the art that comes out of the head.
Dunikowski, on the other hand, his art is spiritual,
it comes from within, from the soul.
As you look at these sculptures, they are simply amazing.
There was an exhibition in Królikarnia –
Dunikowski and Rodin.
I think Rodin doesn't withstand this competition.
But this is just my opinion.
And what do you think about Camille Claudel?
Camille Claudel has been quite advertised by journalists.
She was a very good sculptor, it is evident.
A conflict occurred between her and her master Rodin.
He was quite ruthless.
Of course, Rodin wasn't forging,
it was Camille who was doing some of his work,
Brancusi also forged for him.
There is a photo where Rodin holds a chisel and looking at the photographer taking the photo of him.
He was just modelling, then the others were forging it.
When someone was good, he did it well.
When someone was bad, he did it worse.
For example, Rodin's Kisses, once used to be exhibited at the Museum d'Orsay.
Even someone who doesn't sculpt
could see the differences between them:
the leg was too short from knee to foot, such mistakes there were.
Coutelle took us on a trip to this exhibition to show us
the differences and mistakes made by the so called praticiens,
who usually were stonemasons,
sometimes it was Brancusi.
Anyway, Brancusi, when leaving Rodin, said:
"under a big oak nothing will grow up."
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