”My God this administration is going to kill us” writes Polish artist Henryk Gajewski (b. 1948) in this correspondence with the Danish artist Mogens Otto Nielsen. It tells a story of an ongoing conflict between contemporary artists and the bureaucracy in Eastern and Western Europe in the eighties, including censorship, money problems, visa problems, and – apparently – a misunderstanding at the Danish Embassy in Poland. He writes from Amsterdam, where he had to “build my new life from the begin[n]ing”, as he writes in the letter, after having been thrown out of Poland with a “”one-way passport”, leaving his daughter Helenka and her mother behind the Iron Curtain.
Gajewski's letter to Mogens Otto Nielsen (page 1)
Following the first letter Mogens Otto Nielsen wrote the Royal Danish Embassy in Warsaw and asked for Gajewski’s catalogues. The cultural attaché replied that they received the catalogues from Gajewski, but that he got the impression that the catalogues was “(…) for the disposal of the embassy”. (This correspondence is in Danish).
Stop the robots from taking over
In Gajewski’s last letter in this correspondence (see the gallery) he writes about his children book project “Other Child Book”, other art projects, his stay in Denmark, and about his workshops with children. As he writes in the end of the letter: “Lets work with children. Why not. It is so important to save creativity in the next generation. Other vise human beeing become ROBOT.”
In Gajewski’s last letter in this correspondence (see the gallery) he writes about his children book project “Other Child Book”, other art projects, his stay in Denmark, and about his workshops with children. As he writes in the end of the letter: “Lets work with children. Why not. It is so important to save creativity in the next generation. Other vise human beeing become ROBOT.”
Gajewski embassy letter (page 1)
Love it to read this correspondence of so many years ago