Jan Eustachy Wolski

Jan Eustachy Wolski (b. 1997, Kraków) is a Polish painter who lives and works in Kraków. He studied at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna and the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków. His paintings explore the coexistence of different temporalities within contemporary reality, constructing ambiguous worlds suspended somewhere between the past and an imagined future.

Wolski moves between figuration and abstraction, often placing enigmatic figures within post-industrial or architectural environments whose location and historical moment remain deliberately uncertain. These retro-futuristic dystopias draw on atmospheres of conspiracy, paranoia and para-religious belief, suggesting societies shaped by systems of control, competing groups and struggles over resources and power. Rather than resolving these narratives, Wolski leaves their social structures open to speculation.

Materiality is equally central to his practice. Thick impasto, incisive brushwork, raw jute and occasionally liquid latex create dense, visceral surfaces in which images appear, corrode and dissolve. Recent works increasingly emphasise the unresolved tension between abstraction and figuration, allowing expanses of colour and fragments of imagery to alternately conceal and reveal one another. The surface of the painting becomes a kind of membrane through which meaning remains deliberately unstable.

Wolski has presented solo exhibitions at Neue Alte Brücke, Frankfurt; Piktogram, Warsaw; and Art : Concept, Paris. His work is held in the Pinault Collection, Paris.