Bakos Katalin - Manicka Anna szerk.: Párbeszéd fekete-fehérben, Lengyel és magyar grafika 1918–1939 (MNG, Warszawa–Budapest, 2009)

III. KATALÓGUS - 1. VÁROS. TÖMEG. GÉP. A MODERNIZMUS ARCAI - - Expresszionizmusok: formisták és a poznani Bunt csoport Lengyelországban, aktivisták Magyarországon

Thus, the starting point was the form, which - both in theory and in a work of art - was seen in many various ways by the Formists. Witkacy created his Theory of Pure Form with its principle of unity in plurality and metaphysical references to the Mystery of Existence, and Leon Chwistek (1884-1944) drew up the Theory of Plurality of Realities in Art. These were the only two relatively coherent theoretical systems, the rest of the artists - despite the fact that they also commented publicly on the new art - did not try to embrace the whole matter, and limited themselves to short observations. Tymon Niesiołowski (1882-1965) created the term "Reliefism" (using ligh and shade to represent a three-dimensional solid on a surface), while Tytus Czyżewski (1880-1945) wrote poems close to the Futuristic poetry. Terminology constituted an additional problem: the Polish Formists called themselves Expressionists, Modernists or Cubists, and they acknowledged a kinship with Futurism. Graphic art constitutes an important chapter in the output of Wacław Wąsowicz - he did engraving throughout the whole interwar period. He was, however, primarily a painter, and engraving accompanied his painting and served as a tool for various formal experiments. The artist cut the blocks thickly and hastily, and often and willingly hand-coloured his woodcuts. He was often inspired by folk art, and used a well-marked contour and a decorative composition of the whole surface, which showed itself in a kind of horror vacui. He readily undertook "musical" themes. Szymon Syrkus was mainly an architect, later connected with the avant-garde art. He was shortly engaged in woodcut in the Formist period. The Formists did mainly painting, engraving was merely a margin of their artistic creation. However, the paintings of the Poznań-based Bunt group were nearly entirely lost. Their prints were preserved, and - paradoxically - today Bunt members are almost always treated as graphic artists only. This is, however, clone not without a cause: their graphic art, of a highly expressionistic origin, is of an outstanding artistic quality. The members of Bunt had close contacts with the Berlin artistic circle, they studied in Berlin and Munich, and had the opportunity to see the works of members of "Der Blaue Reiter" and "Die Brücke" groups. They published their engravings in "Zdrój" [Source], a bi-weekly founded by Stanisław Przybyszewski. The group was formally established in 1918, and it was then that the Berlin "Die Aktion" published a special issue devoted to Polish art. The theoretician of the Bunt group was Jerzy Hulewicz (1886-1941), who in his manifesto My [Us] expounded the notion of form as the expression of a unification of Spirit and Absolute, which led to the emergence of what was later named Non-Geometrical Abstraction, and for the time being was called Abstract Expressionism. On the one hand, the art of the Bunt was to express the Spirit of the artist, and on the other hand, it rejected the idea of art for art's sake. They propagated a new image of the world, based on revolutionary slogans of liberty, equality and fraternity. The World War I played a part as well. It is assumed that there was no trauma connected with that period in Poland, that the Poles regained their independence in 1918 and if it had not been for the war, not to mention the Russian Revolution, Poland would still be partitioned. However, in the Poznań region, the former Prussian partition, the influence of German art was much stronger and this theme - although in a very special way appeared in the art of Bunt. Stanisław Kubicki was a graphic artist and an art theoretician. The turning point in his artistic work was the invention of Cubo-Dadaism in 1919, and later the departure from the idea of revolution as a panacea for social injustice. Admittedly, still in 1926, Kubicki did send his works for an exhibition to Moscow, but his views developed in the direction of acknowledging the independence of art from politics. 7"he Tower of Babel II [Wieża Babel II] is an illustration for a text in "Source" from 1917, entitled Building of the Tower. This linocut exists both on its own and in the form of a poster for an exhibition of the Bunt group in Poznań. During an exhibition in Germany, the title of the print was changed into Revolution. Issuing the poster in two language versions made the exhibition popular both among the Polish and the German community of Poznań. The Tower of Babel is a typical example of an engraving from that period, very dynamic, expressive, and hastily