Memory is the central theme of Joie de Vivre, an exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy showing new paintings by Henry Kondracki. Downstairs in the Academician’s gallery, the paintings are hung in a small, bright white space.
Born in Holyrood, many paintings are underpinned by Kondracki’s childhood memories in Edinburgh. The artist was inspired to paint after trips to the cinema as a kid, including the (now Picturehouse) Cameo, evidently struck by on-screen images. Kondracki captures the iconic Casablanca “We’ll always have Paris” airport scene on screen at the Cameo, being watched by a few dozen heads anonymised by the darkness. The inclusion of the fellow visitors makes this painting about an experience of the cinema rather than merely a copy of an on-screen image, illustrating how attending sitting in the dark with strangers is just as important to the memory as the film itself.
Quite a few of the paintings centre iconic images. We see a monochrome The Beatles at the London Palladium, a laughing Tommy Cooper, and Laurel and Hardy atop tiny ponies. These three are all relatively small as if framed by a small television, seen through the eyes of a child. The Impressionist influence of these works crystallises their manifestation of memory, with thick brushstrokes creating an almost blurred effect as if representing the artist’s hazy recollections. In contrast to the fuzzy childhood memory, Blue Holyrood depicts the deceptive nature of remembering with this entirely blue Edinburgh scene, creating a synesthetic muddle of memory; illustrating how one aspect of a memory, like a certain blueness, can permeate our entire record of something in our minds.
Yet it is not purely childhood memory from which these paintings stem. Kondracki stated in a recent interview with the RSA that he thinks about his inspiration behind work “like energy,” and that “looking, observing and drawing brings new energy.” It is impossible to only draw from the same vault of memories from childhood. Though these images can be reimagined in your present consciousness, an artist needs to continue to examine their lived experience for inspiration. It’s ultimately unclear which paintings in the exhibition come from more recent memories, hinting at the idea that remaining in the place you grew up in can allow for memories, distant and near, to meld and form your current perception of a place. Stockbridge Winter blends new and old, with a sentimental warm glow and a high vantage point, giving the impression of an assured conquest of the scene, establishing Kondracki’s beloved, well-explored Edinburgh.
You can visit Henry Kondracki’s Joie de Vivre at the Royal Scottish Academy until November 19th 2023
Photo courtesy of Stella Pope.
