ONLINE VIEWING ROOM
ANDREW WAPINSKI
RECONFIGURATION
Reception Saturday, April 5th, 6-9 pm
ANDREW WAPINSKI
ANDREW WAPINSKI
Born in Saint Clair Pennsylvania, Andrew Wapinski is a visual artist whose current practice is rooted in the memories of interacting with the environment of the historic coal mining town in which he grew up. His work places great importance on the physicality of material and its relationship to artistic process. Melting blocks of pigmented ice, hand ground anthracite coal and the collection of dust from his reductive painting processes lay the foundation for Wapinski to investigate interwoven themes of liminal space, reclamation and material significance as they relate to shifting environments and sense of place.
Wapinski received his BFA in Painting from Kutztown University in Pennsylvania and an MFA in Painting from The University of Delaware. Andrew Wapinski lives and works in Philadelphia, PA.
RECONFIGURATION
Andrew Wapinski is an abstract painter who grew up in a Northeastern Pennsylvania coal mining town. Together, the six counties that make up the area, where Wapinski spent his youth, constitute the only reserves of the United States’ anthracite coal, a key ingredient in pencil lead, among other things. That necessary ingredient of drawing mixed with his childhood experience of a landscape constantly being altered by strip mining forms the basis of his studio practice.
Wapinski combines anthracite coal and blocks of melting ice to make his paintings. The combination of a solid and liquid parallels the make-up of oil paint, which is made by suspending pigment in a binder. Other materials he uses in his work include sumi ink, bone ash, acrylic, and graphite, which he applies to gessoed and ungessoed linen mounted on an aluminum panel. The process is open-ended, allowing both accident and choice to overlap. While we can connect his use of coal to his childhood, and his awareness of the irreparable scars humans make on the landscape, his work goes beyond that relationship without forgetting it.
Wapinski divides his rectangular surfaces into discrete areas, which are either adjacent or stacked atop of each other. The spill of black dust varies in intensity. In Sumi ink painting the artist can control the density of the black. I cite this connection because in using Sumi ink, Wapinski wants his work to reverberate, call to mind different associations, from Japanese ink painting, Color Field painting, gestural painting, maps of rivers, and anthropomorphic shapes such as birds, without becoming derivative or pictorial. They are abstract paintings and we are responsible for our associations.
By opening up our experience to making these connections, while staying true to abstraction, Wapinski invites us to scrutinize dust and stains, the stuff of life, and what we do each day to the environment we dwell in. Beauty and dissipation, birth and decay, become inseparable. They are paintings to be seen and reflected upon.
- John Yau
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 002, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
75h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 001, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash, granite and acrylic on linen mounted panel
75h x 65w x 2d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXVIII, 2025
Anthracite Coal, Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, & Ink on Linen Mounted Panel
48h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXVI, 2025
Anthracite Coal, Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, & Ink on Linen Mounted Panel
75h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XX, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
52h x 45w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXII, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
32 x 28 x 2.5
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXI, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
32h x 28w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 003, 2025
Ice, Anthracite Coal, Sumi Ink, Bone Ash and Acrylic on Linen Mounted Panel
50h x 70w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 004, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
65h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 005, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXXV, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXXVI, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXVIII, 2025
Anthracite Coal, Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, & Ink on Linen Mounted Panel
48h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 004, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
65h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXVI, 2025
Anthracite Coal, Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, & Ink on Linen Mounted Panel
75h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 001, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash, granite and acrylic on linen mounted panel
75h x 65w x 2d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 002, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
75h x 65w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XX, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
52h x 45w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXXVI (detail) 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXII, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
32 x 28 x 2.5 inches
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 005, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXI, 2025
Pigmented Ice, Acrylic, Ink & Graphite on Linen Mounted Panel
32h x 28w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXXVI, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60 x 48 w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Configuration 003, 2025
Ice, Anthracite Coal, Sumi Ink, Bone Ash and Acrylic on Linen Mounted Panel
50h x 70w x 2.50d in
Andrew Wapinski
Untitled XXXV, 2025
ice, anthracite coal, sumi ink, bone ash and acrylic on linen mounted panel
60h x 48w x 2.50d in
