Jan Lenica (1928 - 2001)

Jan Lenica (1928 - 2001)

Studied at the Poznań College of Music.

Studied at the Architecture Department of Warsaw Polytechnic.

Jan Lenica became neither a musician nor an architect. His father, Alfred Lenica, pushed piano lessons on him.  Interestingly, later in life Alfred Lenica became a well-known abstract painter (More on Alfred Lenica later.)  As fate would have it, Jan Lenica emerged as a talented painter and became an illustrator, stage designer, graphic designer, poster artist, and animator. Allegedly he coined the phrase "Polish School of Poster."

From 1963 - 1986 he lived and worked in France.

From 1987 - 2001 he lived and worked in Berlin.

Posters: Jan Lenica started off as a cartoonist for Pins.  His style, often satirical and simplistic, transitioned well into Poster art where he developed a distinctive, almost painterly aesthetic, highlighting abstract use of color and line.

Animation and Films:  Lenica's first films were cut-out stop animations. In both theme and style, his animations built upon his preexisting work in cartoon and poster. In 1957, Lenica produced his first animation Był sobie raz (Once Upon A Time) along with Walerian Borowczyk (More on Borowczyk later).  The pair would henceforth work on many short animated films often experimental in nature, somewhat adult in theme and absurdity, but almost childlike in spirit and imagination. These films would go on to inspire the likes of Roman Polanski, the Brothers Quay, and Terry Gilliam, amongst others.  In 1979, he was the first professor of the animation class at the University of Kassel, Germany. He also taught at Harvard University, Cambridge MA, 1974 and Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin, 1986-1994.

The first thing I did in Kraków during my last visit was to proceed from the train station directly to Stolarska 8-10, the address of Krzysztof Dydo's (more on Krzysztof Dydo later) Galeria Plakatu, Krakow (http://www.cracowpostergallery.com/) to purchase the book Jan Lenica: Labirynt by Ewa Czerwiakowska and Tomasz Kujawski. On a previous to visit to Galeria Plakatu I purchased my first Polish poster:  Lenica's Schach Und Kunst (Chess and Art.)