Sławomir Toman

The paintings of Sławimor Toman are a sophisticated mix of tradition, contemporaneity and the language of global culture. For over 10 years now, paraphrasing the motif of still life, the artist portrays the matter that surrounds him, calling up the primary value of art – mimicry. The atlases, pearls and laces known from Vermeer’s works have found their contemporary counterparts and the surface of plastic, varnished metal, glass or felt is in Toman’s paintings not less illusory than it was in the case of the 17th-century trompe l’oeil artists. Toman is also a painter of a conceptual way of thinking, for whom the realisation of an idea and the creation process itself are the most important. This specific paradox of the clash of the image of a painter of technically perfect paintings (a value in itself of the Western art) with an artist concentrated on the ideological process of creation is one of the most important distinctive marks of Toman’s creative activity. The superior value of his art, equally constant for years, is painting. The ultimate choice of this medium was made during the artist’s studies in France, where, as Toman said himself, no one can paint anymore. That is why he has made painting into his only and technically perfect way of artistic expression.’

Prizes and awards:

2005 - Individual price III-go st. Rector UMCS
2003 - Nomination for Paszport Polityki
2002 - Grant from the Minister of Culture RP.
2001 - Prize of the monthly Arteon in competition Bielska Jesień, BWA Bielsko-Biała
1999 - Award at Bielska Jesień Exhibition, BWA Bielsko-Biała
1995 - Scholarship for Art - Minister of Foreign Affairs France
1993 - Award in competition Porównania, BWA Sandomierz