by Marek Kęskrawiec
I met Bogdan in 1991. It was hate at first sight. A Romanian immigrant that came straight from the dark Ceauşescu Era into the politically-torn Poland of those days and claimed to be the son of a Polish émigré. To add insult to injury, he used fluent Polish and told us that he had spent his youth in famous Timişoara and that he witnessed first-hand the beginnings of the revolution that deposed a dictator called “The Carpathian’s Sun.” As far as I was concerned all this was over the top. Yet everyone else seemed to buy it!
At that time, Kraków’s hemophiliac,
cosmopolitan-hungry and connection-challenged
artistic milieus begged both for fresh
blood and for deliverance from its provincial
idiosyncrasies. No wonder that Achimescu
snuck right in. The local artists were
first impressed by Achimescu’s peculiar
story and, soon thereafter, mystified by
his wide international network of connections
and frequent unexplained travels. I asked
several people if they thought it is normal
that a newcomer from Dracula’s land suddenly
acquires such sophistication. They just
ignored me, or worse, called me a xenophobe
and a weirdo.
Maybe this is why today, in spite of 14
years of psycho(art)manipulation practiced
by Achimescu, I am the only one that understands
the real implication of his works. The
real meaning of all those smoking termite
mounds, of those monumental bunnies posing
as a sphinx, scaring me to death and playing
games with my consciousness.
But let me return to 1991: I closed myself
to the world and embarked on a mission
against Bogdan Achimescu. Since I did not
trust the police, I decided to act as an
undercover agent of sort: I became a newspaper
reporter. Under the concealing outfit of
journalism I could follow my own goal:
Spying
on Achimescu
At first I decided to tiptoe into the Romanian’s
life. It wasn’t difficult. I easily collected
a few commonplace phrases about contemporary
art from its frowning, self-sufficient
eulogists and then started to drop them
here and there during parties and libations
Shortly thereafter I was “on the inside.”
I was finally able to operate from close
range. Despite having daily contact with
my target, I wanted to keep my distance
out of fear of detection. Knowing this
was an extremely dangerous and cunning
type, I expected death at the slightest
mistake…
Have you asked yourself where those creeping
motives come from in Achimescu’s artwork?
Those geometrical elements, those obsessively
multiplied deformed faces, all those mythical
Bunai, obnoxiously gawping at their viewers,
into the void or at each other? All those
perspectives, those scraps of paper, those
ceiling-mounted flags and coffee filters?
Would anyone go through such pain just
for art’s sake, just for the sake of boasting
the same totemic images for many years?
One has to be particularly insensitive
to believe such activities are just an
artistic obsession. This is nothing else
but a carefully instrumented intrigue,
with its keyframes fixing themselves into
the observer’s unsuspecting mind. I first
detected this phenomenon happening with
Bunais drawn on old storage buildings of
the Polish State Railroads on Warszawska
Street in Kraków. An intimidating Bunai,
with nightmarish eyes scrutinizing interstellar
space, displaying undefined genitalia,
his physicality disintegrated with deliberation,
a quintessence of Lovecraft’s absurdly
magical horrors… Yes, I remember that night.
In an instant, I understood that the irritatingly
repetitive motifs spread around the world
are not art but an authentic anticipation
of a frightening invasion, an information
stream that prepares us to receive something
that none of us wishes to receive. I recalled
the day when I saw Bogdan in Kraków’s Art
Bunker, sitting in a tent set in the middle
of the exhibition space. He exhibited his
“creativity” while in reality he stared
alternatively at us and in the void, undoubtedly
receiving signals from his extraterrestrial
superiors and encoding them in our brains.
In the night he would creep upstairs and
sit on the photocopier and xerox his derrière
until he broke the copier’s glass. Repugnance.
Cosmic repugnance. It was he. The same
one. I saw the truth. Every single Bunai
had Bogdan’s eyes. The real Bogdan and
the Bogdans on the walls of the Polish
State Railroads Warehouse. Let me stress
the word “State” here! So the State was
involved in this conspiracy as well?
I ran breathless for miles, away from the
dreadful warehouse, afraid that a Bunai
might descend from its walls and perform
a ritual killing on me or, worse, a ritual
sexual act that would leave me infested
with Bunainess. I revisited the place of
my epiphany a few weeks later.
I should have expected it. The Polish State
Railroads Warehouse site was fenced and
locked. In just a few weeks it was demolished,
purportedly to make place for a new train
station!
I will never believe it.
During the next two or three long years
I lacked the nerve to continue my investigation.
I was troubled and unsure if my true intentions
weren’t by any chance exposed during the
Railroad Warehouse Bunai incident. Things
were quiet; Achimescu either knew nothing
or was playing a game with me. I told myself:
“If this is the case, I accept the challenge.”
For quite a while my observation yielded
harmless findings. It probably was my suspicious
nature that prevented me from drowning
in Bogdan’s codes and thus saved me from
total failure. I started visiting him at
his cave in Kraków’s neighborhood Bronowice.
He was resting there between his professional
travels around the world. It seems that
these travels were taking him more and
more away from his Bunaian totem. He felt
the need to change the vehicle he was riding
toward goals unknown.
I, too, decided to change method. One day
I showed up in his den and I suggested
a trip to Wrocław, claiming I had to deliver
very important journalistic materials there
and planning to stop by a friend in Opole
on the way back. It worked; we were on
our way. In Wrocław I left him on the Renaissance
Plaza and pretended to depart to deliver
my fictitious documents, only to stop at
a safe distance and to start observing
him with my binoculars, tuning into the
radio bug I placed on the side of his bag.
I wanted to see what he would do in an
unfamiliar city, left to himself. Well,
he was doing nothing! His laziness was
total; it was the laziness of his art.
He impersonated the mantra of his own coffee
filters: he sat and sat. At rare intervals
he scratched his head…
Suddenly… Eureka! Bogdan always used to
scratch his head, but today was different
and I finally saw what this is all about.
How could I have not seen this before?
A small antenna was protruding from his
head serving as means of communication
with pangallactic receivers! He’s surgically
removed it since – if you don’t believe
me, check the scar on his head.
I returned to the Wrocław Plaza pretending
not to have noticed a thing, repressing
my dismay, my interior tremor and hiding
the vortex of my thoughts (did I lock my
door upon leaving home? Unplug the clothes
iron? Did I turn the gas off?). We journeyed
to the Actor Friend’s house in Opole. We
tormented ourselves with various psychoactive
substances throughout the night. While
the others were having fun, I was waiting
for Bogdan to loose control and reveal
his own nature. It did not happen. Instead
of an alien’s confession, all we were left
with was a hangover.
He slept with a hat on. It wasn’t a coincidence.
His antenna used to turn into a pulsating
accumulator of human talent at night. This
is how he stole from others the talent
that he pathetically lacked. Staring in
the fluorescent haze, I was motionless,
unable to rip that hat off.
It took me
about two years to regain my composure.
In the meantime, Bogdan continued his neurotic
pilgrimage around the world, working on
his maniacally recurring and precisely
implemented disintegrative mission. I was
more and more taken aback. He made contacts
with terrorist organizations in Ulster
by using his antenna to infect the director
of a prison near Derry. That prison holds
the most famous characters of the Irish
militant movements. Bogdan picked their
brains under the disguise of a probation
program. How is it possible that, among
security clearances and dozens of checkpoints
and gates, not one of the many officers
noticed the secret of this parasite of
humanity, of this talent eater? Did they
not see the antenna? Or is it that Northern
Ireland’s government was a part of the
plot? What about The Queen? What next?
What will the Achimescu-infected inmates
do when they are released?
The conspiracy was becoming a global one.
Bogdan started penetrating the United States,
polluting the Internet with a mesh of concepts
that he has taken from other people’s brains.
Computers and the Web became the tools
of his dirty trade. I realized that the
more I delayed revealing the truth, the
stronger Bogdan grew, using more and more
powerful machines for his art. I could
wait no longer. Towards the end of the
year 2000 I decided to act, almost losing
my life to my mission. I staged a common
visit to some acquaintances (dearest friends,
my apologies for dragging you into such
a perilous game) in Hamburg and Münster.
I therefore had a pretext to visit Achimescu
in his newest den near Lübeck (or was it
Kiel?). There, under the cold Baltic sun,
in the dark scenery of Schleswig-Holstein,
Achimescu was forging a plan to destroy
humankind. Ironically, it is humans that
provided him with a scholarship to do it!
I could not allow it. I decided to drown
him by suggesting a swim in the ice-cold
waves. Unfortunately, the target survived,
although he did not look very good after
that experience.
Bogdan’s revenge was a testament to his
utter lack of scruples.
At first he pretended to be unaffected,
but when we were returning from the coast,
an automobile started circling around us,
its occupants - an old couple - tossing
insults at us, accusing us of destroying
their garden dwarfs. I never did any harm
to Northern German Garden Art but in retrospect
I am sure Bogdan was the perpetrator of
that damage. At the very moment when he
was emerging from the Baltic Sea he directed
his antenna towards one of his numerous
nasty holograms (and towards a stolen hologram
of myself) and ordered them to commit an
act of vandalism in front of two German
retirees. I was thus framed and felt my
end was near as the couple screamed “Polizei,
Polizei!” while gunning the engine of their
Volvo. As I did not speak German (Achimescu
did — what a “coincidence”!) there was
no chance I could argue my innocence. Given
the complexity of Polish-German relationships,
a heavy prison sentence seemed inevitable
and with it, a certain dramatic setback
in my mission unmasking Bogdan.
Achimescu did not foresee my next step:
having uncovered his stratagems I took
cover in the forest. This is why I am still
alive. But what kind of life is this? Chased
by holograms, coffee filters, prayer flags,
incomprehensible geometrical patterns that
I keep trying to count in order to decode
the exact dates of the coming invasion.
Trailed by faces, haunted by nightmarish
tents that trap me in the embarrassing
company of dozens of excited Bunaiesses…
Dreaming of falling into the hands of cruel
surgeons ready to plant an antenna in my
head.
I live like a ghost,
but I keep my eyes on the important things.
I recruited a new agent from Bogdan’s closest
entourage, the secret agent Kazimir (his/her
true identity must remain a secret for
reasons that should now be clear to you).
Thanks to Kazimir I have a good idea about
the nature of Achimescu’s latest works.
I know them well; I understand the denotation
of those magical large buildings concealing
places of dubious worship for invaders,
landing sites for their crafts, observation
posts and transmission relay stations.
I know those piles, meant to cloak the
aggressor’s dead bodies, bodies that will
evaporate into space alongside with the
riches of our planet pillaged and pulverized
and stolen. All these system of artifacts
and procedures are built with one goal
in mind: to dumb us down, to suck us dry,
to trivialize us and then to force us into
the cult of the Sitting Rabbit, installed
in lieu of the treasure of Humankind: The
Late Sphinx. All we will have left to do
is join pilgrimages to the Rabbit and adorn
it, just like we admire the Pyramids today.
If you have any doubts whatsoever about
the above, just ask the “author” what is
the true scale of the buildings in his
drawings. He is sure to be embarrassed.
Believe me, these are no cottages! These
walls of colossal size will soon be built
with your own hands, oh slaves of the near
future. Your food will be made in the other
building from plants genetically distorted
so as to swiftly outgrow even the tallest
mausoleum walls. Can’t you see this in
his drawings?? Some of you will understand
what is happening but it will be too late.
With the few insurgents easily crushed,
the remaining humanity will stampede to
the supermarkets to buy its poison. Shopping
carts will be the invader’s main weapon,
can’t you see?
But we still have time to act.
I wrote the above in the C6 area, secretly
stashing the chlopramine and haloperidol
I’m being given. I truly believe that agent
Kazimir will take my warning to the outside
world before Bogdan shows in America. Yes,
despite suffering many defeats I do believe
the World will finally understand the truth.
The truth is, there is no Achimescu. It
is me that created all of this.
Marek Kęskrawiec is an award winning
Polish investigative journalist. He works
for Newsweek Poland and for Poland’s TVN
Television