Tadeusz Kantor

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Tadeusz Kantor

Tadeusz Kantor (April 6, 1915 – December 8, 1990) was a Polish painter, assemblage artist, set designer and theatre director. Kantor was well renowned for his revolutionary performances in Poland and abroad.

Born in Wielopole Skrzyńskie, Galicia (in what was then Austria-Hungary), Kantor graduated from the Cracow Academy in 1939. During the Nazi occupation of Poland, he founded the Independent Theatre, and served as a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków as well as a director of experimental theatre in Kraków from 1942 to 1944. Following the war, he become known for his avant-garde work in stage design including designs for Saint Joan (1956) and Measure for Measure (1956). Specific examples of such changes to standard theatre were stages that extended out into the audience, and the use of mannequins as real-life actors.

Becoming disenfranchised by the avant-garde's increasing institutionalization, in 1955 he and a group of visual artists formed a new theatre, Cricot 2. In the 1960s, he traveled widely with his theatre, becoming known for staging "happenings". His interest was mainly with the absurdists and Polish writer Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz (also known as "Witkacy"). The Cuttlefish (1956) and The Water Hen (1969) were his best known productions during this time. A 1972 performance of The Water Hen was described as "the least-publicised, most talked-about event at the Edinburgh festival".

Tadeusz Kantor, commemorative bust

Dead Class (1975) was the most famous of his theatre pieces of the 1970s. Within the piece, Kantor himself took the role of a teacher who presided over seemingly dead characters who are confronted by mannequins which represented their younger selves. He had began experimenting with the juxtaposition of mannequins and live actors in the 1950s.

His later works of the 80s were very personal reflections. As in Dead Class, he would sometimes represent himself onstage. In the 1990s, his works became well known in the United States due to presentations at Ellen Stewart's La MaMa Experimental Theater Club.

Throughout his life, Kantor has had an interesting and unique relationship with Jews, despite being a nominal Catholic and having a father with anti-semitic tendencies, Kantor incoporated many elements of what was known as "Jewish theatre" into his works.

Kantor died in Kraków.

[edit] Productions and works

After the war he set up his own avant-garde theatre, Cricot 2, where, amongst others, the works of Witkacy were presented:

The Cuttlefish (1956)
The Hyrcanian World View
In the Small Mansion
The Madman and the Nun
The Water Hen (1968)
Where Are the Snows of Yesteryear (1982)
Let the Artist Die! (1985)
I Shall Never Return (1988)
Today is My Birthday (1990)

His most important works are:

The Dead Class (1975)
Wielopole, wielopole (1980)
You will never return here (1985)

His best known paintings are:

Man with Umbrella (1949)
the Industrial bags series (1964)
Emballage (1964 - 1975)
the Nothing any more series (1986 - 1990)
September Defeat (1990)

[edit] References

Kobialka, Michal, ed and trans. "A Journey Through Other Spaces: Essays and Manifestos, 1944-1990." Publisher: University of California Press, 1993. ISBN 0-520-08423-3
Wilson, Edwin. Goldfarb, Alvin. Living Theatre: A History. Publisher: McGraw-Hill, 4th edition. August 5, 2003. ISBN 0-07-256257-9