Rafal Topolewski

Rafal Topolewski (b. 1983, Grudziadz, Poland; lives and works in London)

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Banality, triviality, drawing and architecture form the core interests in Rafal’s painting practice. The paintings are made intuitively—led by line, form and texture—and then become subject to a period of consideration and combination, inside and outside frame of work.  The subject matter is of secondary, almost incidental interest to the artist whose use of repeated motifs (objects for sale, imagined landscapes, palm and pine trees) are chosen as much for their challenging textures as for their concepts or stories. Nonetheless these small, densely painted images are richly allusive, claustrophobic, reminiscent perhaps of Kipling’s night forest. 

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Rafal studied Architecture at the Wroclaw University before studying Fine Art at Manchester Metropolitan University and then at the Royal Academy Schools, London. He has exhibited at The International 3, (Manchester), The Royal Standard (Liverpool), Malgras Naudet (Manchester) London Art Fair with the Catlin Guide, at Art Gwangju with Castlefield Gallery, CAVE art-fair and with The International 3 at Art 13. Topolewski was one of the four finalists of The Saatchi Gallery and Channel 4’s New Sensations Prize 2012, and was invited by The Zabludowicz Collection to take part in Testing Ground: Master Class. His work is held in a number of private collections and in The Saatchi Collection.