Andrzej Taranek

Andrzej Taranek (born 1953) is a Polish graphic artist, painter, and author. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk in 1982 and earned his Ph.D. from the same institution in 2015 with a dissertation titled The Landscape of Gdańsk as a Cultural Heritage Amid Ongoing Transformations" (Polish: Krajobraz Gdańska jako dziedzictwo kulturowe wobec zachodzących przemian). Taranek's work, which specializes in printmaking, drawing, and painting, often explores the history and landscape of his native Gdańsk. His art has been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Poland and abroad, earning him several awards and distinctions. His pieces are held in prominent collections, including the National Museum in Gdańsk, the National Library in Warsaw, and the Ossolineum Library in Wrocław, as well as in galleries and private collections across Europe and the USA.

Biography

Charcoal and pencil drawing by Andrzej Taranek depicting an ornate, historic arched gateway in Gdańsk, with intricate wrought iron details and a view into a shadowed passage.

Biography

Andrzej Taranek (born November 22, 1953, in Gdańsk) is a graphic and painting artist. He is the son of Mieczysław (December 4, 1908, Warsaw – March 8, 1987, Gdańsk) and Irena, née Chrapka (February 2, 1913, Częstochowa – September 28, 2004, Gdańsk). From 1976 to 1982, he studied art at the Faculty of Painting and Graphic Arts at the State College of Fine Arts (PWSSP), now the Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk (ASP Gdańsk). He earned his diploma in the studio of Professor Witold Janowski.

From 1985 to 1987, he was a teacher at the State High School of Fine Arts in Gdynia-Orłowo, and from 1991 to 1994, he lived in the Caribbean. Starting in the mid-1990s, he collaborated with the Gdańsk University Press, also designing for Ossolineum and other publishing houses. He is the author of posters, illustration series, and graphic designs for books. In 2008 and 2014, he was a scholarship recipient of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. In 2015, he defended his doctoral dissertation titled The Landscape of Gdańsk as a Cultural Heritage Amid Ongoing Transformations" (Polish: Krajobraz Gdańska jako dziedzictwo kulturowe wobec zachodzących przemian), at the Faculty of Graphic Arts at ASP Gdańsk.

Since graduating, Taranek has dedicated himself to creative work, practicing fine art printmaking, drawing, and painting. His works are distinctly Gdańsk-themed, from which he builds a deeply personal world full of universal references to the past and the transient nature of life. A vast collection of what he calls his "drawn journal," comprising several hundred works, shows important, and sometimes just subtle, relics of the past that are disappearing from the landscape of Gdańsk and its surroundings. He has also designed medals, including those for the Gdańsk University of Technology (2004, 2007), a medal dedicated to the rector of the Gdańsk Medical University, Roman Kaliszan (2020), and a medal and pin for the 100th anniversary of the Gdańsk Scientific Society (2022).

Taranek has held solo exhibitions at various venues, including the 9th International Amber Fair "Amberif" (2002), the State Art Gallery in Sopot (2004), Collected Crumbs at Uphagen House in Gdańsk (2011), the Teacher's House in Vilnius (2012), the paint room of the Wojciech Bogusławski Theatre in Kalisz (2013), and the Faculty of Graphic Arts at ASP Gdańsk (2015). In 2019, he exhibited Carthage and the Ancient World of North Africa (Polish: Kartagina i świat antyczny północnej Afryki), as well as the Contemporary Image of the Maghreb (polish: Współczesny Obraz Maghrebu) at the Archaeological Museum in Gdańsk. His group exhibitions include Personalities at Blik Gallery in Gdańsk (2012).

His works are held in the collections of the National Museum in Gdańsk, the National Library in Warsaw, the Ossoliński National Institute in Wrocław, the Gdańsk Library of the Polish Academy of Sciences, as well as in private collections in Poland, Italy, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Finland, the USA, Lithuania, and the West Indies.

He has received numerous awards, including at the Józef Gielniak All-Polish Graphic Competition (Jelenia Góra 1983, 1989), a special award at the International Veterinary Ex Libris Competition (1996), and the Gdańsk Society of Friends of Art (GTPS) awards for Gdańsk Print of the Year (1983, 1990, 1995) and the GTPS Artistic Award for 2011. He was also honored in the 5th Polish-Finnish Marine Graphics Competition (1983) and by the GTPS for Gdańsk Print of the Year (1985, 1989), as well as in the Polish Society of Book Publishers' competition for the Most Beautiful Book of the Year (1997, 1998, 1999).

Taranek is also an author, with published stories such as Four Views of Mount Fuji from the Gdańsk Shipyard (Polish: Cztery widoki góry Fuji widziane ze Stoczni Gdańskiej) (Gdańsk, 2012), articles like In Memory of Jan Heweliusz's Work Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia Exlibrys Papieża Jana Pawła II, in: Jan Heweliusz and Heweliuszian Culture (Gdańsk, 1987), and exhibition commentaries like Collected Crumbs (Polish: Okruchy zebrane), Graphics and Drawing, in: Germanica Gedanensia (2011, no. 25).

In 1995, he was featured in a series on Gdańsk artists by the Gdańsk Television Center. In the same year, the "Gift of Gdańsk" Foundation for Abused Children organized a solo exhibition and auction of his prints to benefit Special Primary School No. 4 in Gdańsk Oliwa. In 1997, he participated in a documentary film about Gdańsk, its recent history, and its artists, produced for the German television station ZDF. His work has been written about by Kazimierz Nowosielski in a detailed essay in the bimonthly journal "Topos" (1997, no. 2) and in his work Gallery. On Selected Contemporary Painters and Painting (Gdańsk, 2008). Paweł Huelle also wrote an introduction to the catalog for his solo exhibition at the State Art Gallery (Sopot, 2004). In 2022, he was awarded the 100th Anniversary Medal of the Society of Friends of Science and Art in Gdańsk, the Gdańsk Scientific Society, and the Gdańsk Society of Friends of Art.

He was married to Elżbieta, née Łoś (June 18, 1951 – March 3, 2015, Gdańsk), a proofreader at "Ossolineum" in 1983. They had three children, including Jędrzej (born July 25, 1984, Gdańsk), a graduate of the Acting Department of the State Higher School of Theatre in Wrocław (now the Acting Department in Wrocław of the Stanisław Wyspiański Academy of Theatre Arts in Kraków). Jędrzej Taranek is a co-founder (2011) and president of the EKIPA Theatre Association and has played the character of Jędrzej Paruzel, a police forensic technician, in the TVP1 series Father Mateusz since 2008.