Time Restored – In the Footsteps of Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski
On 31 July 2026, the opening of the exhibition ‘Time Returned: In the Footsteps of Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski’ took place at the Desa Unicum auction house gallery in Warsaw.
This project was initiated by the Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski Foundation in collaboration with the artist and photographer Sylwia Makris. Its aim is to present Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski’s work in a new, contemporary form and to bring it closer to today’s audience. Sylwia Makris drew inspiration from both the painter’s works and the places particularly associated with his life – Munich and the Suwałki region. The artist does not seek to literally recreate Wierusz-Kowalski’s works, but rather engages in a creative dialogue with them, transposing their atmosphere, characters and motifs into the present day. Bolesław Bernard Święcicki, a descendant of Alfred, played a special role in the project; he took on the role of his ancestor and brought the entire series of works together. Other descendants of the Wierusz-Kowalski family and residents of the Suwałki region also took part in the project. The photographs were taken in Munich, Suwałki and on location in the Suwałki region, creating a symbolic link between places significant to the painter’s life and work. The project demonstrates that Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski’s art can still be inspiring more than a century later and speak to audiences through the contemporary language of photography. ‘Time Returned’ is, at the same time, a story of memory, family roots, longing for one’s homeland, and the meeting of the past with the present.
Text by the author, Sylwia Makris, from the exhibition catalogue:
This exhibition arose from a need to seek out traces and meanings in space, in time and within oneself. It came about at the invitation of the Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski Foundation. I was inspired by the figure of Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski. A painter who lived in Munich for many years, yet carried Poland in his heart. His story struck a particularly close chord with me, as I too live in Munich. I know what it is like to create, work and live far from the country that still remains a part of me. I know what everyday life is like when longing becomes a driving force, and memories take on a new radiance when one tries to capture them in a painting. Whilst working on the project, I set out to follow in Alfred’s footsteps. I was looking for places that might have been dear to him. I didn’t want to simply retrace his steps, but to feel his presence and see the world as he saw it. In Suwałki, I discovered something completely new. It was a very personal experience for me, as I hadn’t known Suwałki before. It turned out to be an almost magical place – peaceful, simple, yet full of light and truth. Walking through the meadows and fields of Suwałki, I truly felt Alfred’s spirit. I wondered what he would be painting today, what sort of people he would choose as his models, and what stories he would want to tell through his paintings. In this landscape, in this silence and space, time seemed to truly stand still. The past and the present came together in one place. His grandson, Bolesław Bernard Święcicki, became my ‘Alfred’; he beautifully brought the whole series of paintings together. ‘Time Returned’ is therefore, for me, an attempt at a conversation — with Alfred, with places, and with myself. It is not an attempt to reconstruct his life, but a dialogue between two sensibilities which, despite a gap of over a hundred years, find common ground in the same need to create, to observe the world attentively and to preserve it in memory. Munich is a city that has become for me a place of both everyday life and longing. This is where I live, where I create, and where I try to find a balance between the unfamiliar and the familiar. It is also the city of Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski, a place where he found his artistic fulfilment, but where, like me, he no doubt often felt the absence of Poland. I am not trying to imitate Alfred. Instead, I am having a conversation with him. I wonder how he would view this city today, how he would see its colours, light and people. Munich has become for me not just a backdrop, but also a mirror, a reflection of my longing and his presence. For me, Suwałki is a place of closeness. I have the impression that it was there that Alfred truly felt completely happy. There is something pure and primal about this landscape that allows one, for a moment, to believe that art can turn back time.
Sylwia Makris was born in 1973 in Gdynia. After graduating from the Magdalena Abakanowicz State Secondary School of Fine Arts in Gdynia-Orłowo, she worked as a sculptor. In 2007, she discovered photography, which over time became her primary means of artistic expression.
In her work, the artist combines photography with traditional painting and craft techniques. She repeatedly reworks the recorded image of her created reality, manipulating the digital record, which she then fixes using painting techniques. In her works, real time intertwines with historical time, the visible with the imagined, and the real with the essence of things.
The artist currently works as a freelance photographer in Munich. ‘I don’t take photographs, I create images,’ she said in one interview. Speaking about her creative process, she explained: ‘The project takes shape in detail in my mind, and then moves on to the preparatory stage. From the material produced during the shoot, I select photographs for what is known as ‘processing’. In my case, I call it ‘ruining’. I ‘spoil’ the photograph until it ceases to be a photograph and becomes a painting. Projects printed on canvas are further treated with varnishes and wax.
Selected exhibitions by Sylwia Makris include shows at the Kunsthalle in Munich in 2019 and 2022, the Underdog Gallery in London in 2018 and 2019, the Last Rites Gallery in New York in 2019, the Samurai Museum in Berlin in 2022 and 2025, and the European Solidarity Centre in Gdańsk in 2018 and 2021.
The artist’s selected projects include *Black is colourful* from 2025, *Metropolis* from 2024, *Paint so that Poland may rise again* (J. Malczewski) from 2021, *Tarot* from 2018 and *Old Masters* from 2017.
The project *Time Returned: In the Footsteps of Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski*, commissioned by the Alfred Wierusz-Kowalski Foundation, is Sylwia Makris’s first large-scale undertaking devoted entirely to the work of a single artist.