Anita Kucharczyk Transforms Space And Perception Through The Power Of Light

Photo: Artist Anita Kucharczyk in her Southern California studio, where she explores the boundaries between light, space, and perception.

Breaking Boundaries With Light

Polish-born artist Anita Kucharczyk explores light’s transformative properties through painting, installation, and projection mapping, creating immersive experiences that challenge perception while blending traditional techniques with innovative approaches.

Anita Kucharczyk’s luminous artworks transcend traditional boundaries, inviting viewers into a realm where light becomes both medium and message. The Polish-born artist, now making waves in Southern California’s vibrant art scene, masterfully manipulates light and color to create immersive experiences that challenge our perception of space and reality.

Through her sophisticated understanding of light’s transformative power, Kucharczyk has established herself as a compelling voice in contemporary art. Her work seamlessly blends traditional oil painting techniques with innovative approaches to installation and projection mapping, creating environments that pulse with ethereal energy. The artist’s unique ability to harness both natural and artificial light sources results in installations that seem to breathe and evolve, engaging viewers in an ever-changing dialogue with their surroundings.

What makes Kucharczyk’s work particularly fascinating is her rejection of conventional color theory constraints in favor of a more intuitive, emotionally-driven approach. Her international exhibition history, spanning from New York to Tokyo, demonstrates the universal appeal of her light-based explorations. As she continues to push the boundaries of her practice, Kucharczyk’s work reminds us that light is not just a physical phenomenon but a powerful tool for emotional and spiritual connection.

In this exclusive interview, Kucharczyk shares insights into her creative process, her evolution as an artist, and her ongoing quest to capture light’s mystical qualities. Her candid responses reveal not only her technical expertise but also her deep philosophical engagement with the nature of perception and experience in contemporary art.

Kucharczyk’s masterful manipulation of light and color creates transcendent experiences that revolutionize how we perceive space and reality.

How did your fascination with light and its mystical qualities first develop, and what led you to focus on it as your primary subject matter?

My fascination with light is innate – I’ve always been drawn to bright spaces and instinctively moved away from darker ones. However, the pivotal moment came during my diploma project ‘Silence’ at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in 2015. It was then that I recognized light as the driving force behind my works.

The project consisted of paintings depicting deserted interiors of an abandoned apartment building in Poland. In these works, light becomes almost tangible as it streams through the windows of vacant rooms, filling each canvas with an ethereal presence. Though the spaces were physically abandoned, they weren’t empty – the light imbued them with warmth, suggesting a lingering human presence.

Over the years, light has increasingly become the central focus of my artistic practice. My work has evolved from figurative to abstract expression, gradually distilling to its most essential elements.

Could you describe how the Light and Space Movement has influenced your approach to working with light, colour, and form?

In my explorations, I primarily employ oil painting, a traditional medium, challenging myself to achieve powerful immersive effects without the conventional materials of the Light and Space movement—resin, plastic, glass, and fluorescent lights. Through my canvases, I strive to create encompassing environments that alter perception. I carefully study each exhibition space beforehand, arranging works to integrate seamlessly with their surroundings. Rather than considering pieces in isolation, I approach them as a cohesive collective. The canvases are meant to be experienced not only individually but as part of a transformative spatial environment that becomes an experience in itself.

“My fascination with light is innate” – Anita Kucharczyk

You mention that each color has a specific emotional resonance; how do you choose and combine colors in your projects to evoke particular emotions?

While each color carries emotional resonance, I’ve found that their impact is deeply personal to each viewer. Take yellow, for instance. Kandinsky wrote in ‘Concerning the Spiritual in Art’ (1911) that ‘Yellow is the typical earthly color. It never has a profound meaning. An intermixture of blue makes it a sickly color.’ However, through my artistic practice, I’ve observed that people’s reactions to colors and their combinations are as unique as their life experiences. While we can make generalizations about color theory, I believe art should move beyond these broad assumptions. My approach is to create works based on my personal emotional responses to color, then invite viewers to experience them through their own emotional lens. This creates a more authentic dialogue between the work and its audience, where each viewer’s interpretation is equally valid and valuable.

“The biggest challenge is not repeating myself” – Anita Kucharczyk

While my medium of choice is oil painting, my exploration of light extends beyond that to include various reflective materials like glitter and copper flakes, as well as concave and convex mirrors. I work with both artificial and natural light sources, each offering unique opportunities for artistic expression. Artificial light provides precise control, making it ideal for curated interior exhibitions where I can create specific visual effects. Natural light, however, introduces a dynamic element of constant change. This has led me to discover fascinating interactions between my pieces and their environment – how they not only alter the surrounding landscape but are themselves transformed by it. This revelation came when I began moving my works from the controlled environment of my studio into different contexts, opening up new dimensions in my understanding of light’s interactive properties.

How do you view the role of the audience in your work, and how does their interaction complete or alter the meaning of each piece?

The audience’s role is to experience the paintings. While some encounters are brief, with people passing by and ignoring my work, others study each piece with great interest and excitement, surprising me with their discoveries. I love watching them compare colors and proportions and share their insights. Every reaction tells me something about my work. I’ve learned not to expect specific responses and instead allow myself to be surprised. I’m glad that my works have had the opportunity to face an audience rather than remain hidden in a closet.

What challenges do you encounter in your ongoing examination of light, and how do these challenges inspire or inform new directions in your artwork?

The biggest challenge is not repeating myself. Sometimes I think I’m done with a specific material or color, and then it comes back to me. It’s an ongoing process. All it takes is changing the hue or proportions of colors in the composition to offer a completely different experience and—what I hope for most—a new art piece. There are moments when I feel stuck approaching the matter of light in the same way over and over again; then I know it’s definitely time to change my way of doing things and jump out of my comfort zone.

EDITOR’S NOTE

In this contemplative diptych, Kucharczyk masterfully explores the interplay of light, space, and everyday objects. The composition, split by a bold vertical line, presents a minimalist dining scene featuring a table with a white cloth and two distinctly different chairs. The warm ochre walls contrast beautifully with the cool blue-gray floor, while a solitary pitcher anchors the center. The artist’s careful attention to light and shadow creates a meditative atmosphere, transforming an ordinary domestic scene into something extraordinary. The red chair cushion adds a striking accent, demonstrating Kucharczyk’s sophisticated understanding of color balance and spatial relationships.