Artist in Poland

David, our translator and tour director, mentioned on our first day in Poland that his uncle was an artist--a surrealist--who lived in the same town we were staying in outside of Warsaw. He said his uncle, Tadeusz Puszcz (pronounced, Tah-DEH-oosh Pooshch), was his favorite artist, and not just because they're related, and when we said we'd like to see his paintings, David arranged for us to visit him the next day.

His was an artist's home, red brick covered in ivy that declared the coming of autumn. Inside, dark wood and antique furniture graced the living room, and up a narrow set of stairs was his studio. It was a large room with wide windows that didn't let in enough light to suit his painting, so he works at night. Along the back wall he had racks of his paintings, and he pulled them out and set them up around the room for us to see them.

I can see why David likes his uncle's work so well. We did too. Each picture has a surprise, some detail that doesn't belong in the real world but that makes his paintings intriguing.

I especially loved the way he captured the light as it shone through water in a glass and cast shadow and light on the table. The glasses he painted looked almost like photographs to me.

Tadeusz said he's had gallery shows, but his paintings haven't sold well. People like them, but they usually don't want to hang them in their houses. I don't see why, though. There are some, like the one with the candle, that I would love to have. It's on his website, with a sampling of his work.

He was gracious to the three of us American women who practically invited ourselves to his home, serving us tea and coffee (herbata i kawa) outside under the trees and the warm blue sky. His English--self-taught, like David's--is excellent, and we had good conversation.

He said his paintings take about two months to finish, because they're so large and so detailed. In the past, he'd tried painting smaller ones, but afterword he regretted not having made made them bigger, so now he only paints the larger ones.

For a man who paints because he must, he was encouraged that we liked his work so much, and I recognized a bit that desire for approval. For an artist, a writer, a photographer, the creation process is usually done in solitude, but as much as the work comes out of a need for expression, within that need is a hope for an audience. On that day in Milanówek, Poland, I was honored to be part of that audience.