Gérard Gasiorowski, artiste français dont l'opus polymorphe, mais essentiellement pictural, s'est déroulé sur deux décennies seulement, a oscillé d'un photoréalisme austère et raffiné à un expressionnisme tourmenté et parfois lyrique. Mais si cette œuvre use indéniablement des moyens de la peinture, elle se veut avant tout, par son dispositif global, une réflexion critique sur la production esthétique de son temps et les différentes instances de l'art. Après une ascension fulgurante de peintre distingué, ayant épuisé les vertus de l'image, cet enfant terrible brise ses jouets pour se retrancher en un long cycle de travaux dit régressifs, avant de revenir à une interprétation grave et majestueuse de son histoire intime de l'art. Si ces trois temps de l'œuvre peuvent être lus comme des phases, ils peuvent être également considérés comme les chapitres d'un récit où l'auteur serait aussi le ou les personnages. Car, et de façon délibérée, c'est sur le registre de la fiction que l'ouvrage pictural s'est élaboré. Dérision et autodérision auront conduit Gasiorowski, pour échapper aux classifications d'usage, aux académismes, à inventer l'artiste qui saurait au mieux servir la peinture sans se servir. Car «Peinture» était pour lui corps et langage, soit une entité complexe et non un simple produit. S'appuyant sur une documentation augmentée et en partie inédite (exhumations des archives et de certaines œuvres) ainsi que sur une enquête portant sur les sources iconographiques utilisées par l'auteur, ce travail a, entre autres, permis d'établir que cette stratégie était présente, à l'œuvre, dès le début. / Gérard Gasiorowski was a French artist whose polymorphic, though essentially pictorial work, was developed over two decades only, and oscillated from an austere and sophisticated photorealism to a tormented and occasionally lyrical expressionism. But if his work undeniably uses the painting medium, it claims to be, before everything and as a whole, a critical thought of the aesthetic production of his time and the different art authorities. After a dazzling ascension as a eminent painter, this terrible child, having exhausted all the properties of the image, breaks his toys to take refuge in a long cycle of so-called regressive works, before returning to a serious and majestic interpretation of his persona! history of art. If these three moments can be seen as phases of his work, they can be considered as chapters of a novel as well, in which the author would also be the character(s), for his pictorial work has been based on fiction, in a deliberate way. Mockery and self-mockery finally led Gasiorowski to invent the artist who would know how to serve painting without serving himself, in order to escape usual classifications and academicism. Because « Painting » was a body, a language, i complex entity to him, and not just a product. Based on an extended and partly new documentation (exhumation of archives and some previously unseen works) and a survey on the iconographic sources used by the artist, this dissertation has, among other things, enabled to establish that this strategy was present in Gasiorowski's work since the beginning.

The book Postproduction: Culture as Screenplay, written by French aesthetician Nicolas Bourriaud is going to be initial text for my diploma thesis. Bourriaud claims, that contemporary art is mostly made by the principle of assemblage; art works are made by reinterpretation, reproducing or by new exhibiting of artefacts or forms of past. The assumption of the original concept in artworks of contemporary artists - semionauts (travelers in the worlds of signs) has been allready completely ineffective. Through the example of hyperrealistic paintings, which has lately reappeared in portfolios of international and czech artists, I will try to show whether its revilal is based on the emergence of new medias, that even more than in the seventies simulate reality or whether they deal with the concept of postpostprodution - the artists lend only formal, in this case, hyperrealistic, signs. This diploma thesis will be completed by the case study of paintings of czech hyperrealist painter Jan Mikulka.

Thesis (MA)--University of Stellenbosch, 2011. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: This thesis is an investigation into the relationship between photorealistic painting and specific devices used to aid the artist in mediating the real. The term 'reality' is negotiated and a hybrid theoretical approach to photorealism, including mimesis and semiotics, is suggested. Through careful analysis of Vermeer's suspected use of the camera obscura, I argue that camera vision already started in the 17th century, thus signalling the dramatic shift from the classical Cartesian perspective scopic regime to the model of vision offered by the camera long before the advent of photography. I suggest that contemporary photorealist painters do not just merely and objectively copy, but use photographic source material with a sophisticated awareness in response to a rapidly changing world. Through an examination of the way in which the camera obscura and photographic camera are used in the works of four artists, I suggest that a symbiotic relationship of subtle tensions between painting and photographic technology emerges. This results in visions of the painted real that may be meaningful to contemporary society and have the ability to emotionally affect the viewer. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie tesis ondersoek die verhouding tussen fotorealistiese skilderkuns en die spesifieke metodes wat die kunstenaar se vertolking van die werklikheid vergemaklik. Die term, 'realiteit' word krities oorweeg te midde van 'n saamgestelde teoretiese aanslag tot fotorealisme wat mimesis en semiotiek insluit. Deur 'n noukeurige analise van Vermeer se oënskynlike gebruik van die camera obscura, hou ek voor dat fotografiese sig reeds sedert die 17e eeu teenwoordig is. Hierdie gewaarwording dui op 'n dramatiese skuif vanaf 'n klassieke, Kartesiaanse perspektief en skopiese regime tot die model van visie gebied deur die kamera, lank voor die ontwikkeling van fotografie. Ek stel voor dat kontemporêre fotorealistiese skilders nie bloot objektief kopieër nie, maar fotografiese verwysings met 'n gesofistikeerde bewussyn in reaksie tot 'n vinnigveranderende wêreld gebruik. Deur 'n ondersoek na die wyse waarop die camera obscura en fotografiese kamera in die werke van vier kunstenaars gebruik word, stel ek voor dat 'n simbiotiese verhouding die subtiele spanning tussen skilderkuns en fotografiese tegnologie meemaak. Dit lei tot visionêre weergawes van 'n geskilderde realiteit wat 'n betekenisvolle posisie in die kontemporêre samelewing beklee en die moontlikheid besit om die toeskouer op 'n emosionele vlak te affekteer.