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JULIAN STANCZAK artist

Born in Borownica, Poland, American painter and printmaker Julian Stanczak lost the use of his right arm during his time in a WWII-era forced-labor camp in Siberia. At 13, Stanczak escaped from Siberia to join the Polish army-in-exile in Persia then spent the rest of his teenage years in a hut in a Polish refugee camp in Uganda. It was there he learned to write and paint left-handed. He reconnected with his family, moved to the United States in 1950 settling in Cleveland, Ohio.

The style known as Op Art was named for Stanczak's first major show held at the Martha Jackson Gallery in New York in 1964. Op art works are abstract, with many of the better known pieces made in only black and white. When the viewer looks at them, the impression is given of movement, hidden images, flashing and vibration, patterns, or alternatively, of swelling or warping. Stanczak has never liked the term. It makes people think of visual tricks, he says, and that's not what his work is about.

Stanczak lives and works in Seven Hills, Ohio with his wife, the sculptor, Barbara Stanczak. She is a professor at the Cleveland Institute of Art (Stanczak taught there from 1964 to 1995).

From: American Council for Polish Culture (ACPC) 63rd Convention Program, July 14-17, 2011, Cleveland, Ohio, at the Pope John Paul II Polish-American Cultural Center

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