Andrew Malag, Connection 2023

oil on panel, 95 cm x 100 cm

The atmosphere of a seaport, a shipyard - watching new beautiful ships mature at the outfitting quay - getting bigger and more advanced as technology and experience develop - addressed to various home ports of the world may have triggered young Andrzej Malág's imagination and interests. At the same time, the wide bodies of water of the Oder River and the Szczecin Lagoon, misty landscapes, proximity to the sea - nautical elements are present in all his paintings. At the Palace of Youth in Szczecin (later the Youth House of Culture) in the Art Studio, of which he became a participant before he became a student in elementary school, instructors (probably "paratroopers" from Lviv) showed the workshop of art, while "infecting" children and young people with the traditions of ancient and classical culture. One of the features of the microclimate of Western Pomerania is the frequent rains in summer. Walking in the rain at night and looking through glasses at the street lights shining through the leaves of trees, one can immediately notice the characteristic ...striated structures initiated by raindrops on the glasses.
These very different interference figures are formed, despite the near-zero coherence length of the streetlamp light, because the difference in optical paths is also close to zero.... At the time, walking in the rain, still young, Andrew could not understand it, but the visual effect remained in his memory for a long time....