“Ghosts and Roots”—Solo Exhibition by Marcin Janusz

FIERMAN Gallery: 19 Pike Street, New York, NY 10002

Opening: Friday October 24, 2025 | 6 PM
Walkthroughs with Marcin Janusz: October 28 & October 29 | 6:30 PM
On view: October 24 – November 23, 2025

FIERMAN presents Ghosts and Roots, Polish artist Marcin Janusz‘s first solo exhibition in New York.
Comprised of large scale paintings created in New York at Residency Unlimited alongside new stained glass
and hand-blown glass sculptures, Ghosts and Roots is a story about Slavic mythology – about forgotten spirits
and buried roots. The exhibition intertwines folk tales with ecological reflection, evoking the timeless dialogue
between human beings and the natural world. Drawing from Eastern European folklore and the oral tradition of
storytelling, Marcin Janusz reinterprets ancient legends through the lens of contemporary experience in this new
series of paintings. His inspiration comes from myths born out of the observation of natural phenomena – from
awe at the world of plants, the elements, and the cosmos.

The artist challenges the conventions of classical oil painting by experimenting with materiality – incorporating
soil, sugar, and resin alongside paint. Through these formal gestures, he transforms his canvases into reliefs,
imbuing each element of the composition with symbolic meaning.

The title of the exhibition points both to an ancestral rootedness in ancient narratives and to the need to
rediscover our connection with the world around us – here and now. Referring to Slavic mythology, the artist
invokes deities and demons who shaped the myth of creation and the order of the world – figures such as
Perun and Weles. Janusz also tells the story of the Drowned Man, fascinated by will-o’-the-wisps that lured him
into the depths; Dziewanna, the goddess of meadows and fertility; and Nawia, the realm of the dead hidden
deep beneath the earth. Featured works also echo traces of old rituals – dances by the fire, the summoning of
rain, and midsummer ceremonies in search of the mythical fern flower, believed to bring happiness and
prosperity. These motifs represent opposing yet complementary forces: sky and earth, day and night, fire and
water, life and death. In this way, Ghosts and Roots becomes a reflection on the cycles of nature, the memory
of matter, and the spiritual dimension of human rootedness.

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About

Marcin Janusz (b. 1991, Poland, lives and works in Kracow, PL) received his Master of Arts from the Jan Matejko Academy of Fine Arts Faculty of Painting in 2018 followed by a PhD at the same in 2023. Janusz’s recent solo exhibitions include Milky Flesh, LETO, Warsaw, PL (2024); Once Upon a Time… Life, Szara Kamienica Gallery, Kraków, PL (2024). Recent group exhibitions include Let me tell you about myself / about us, National Museum in Gdańsk, PL (2025); Nostalgia. Seekers of Fading Stars, MOCAK, Kraków, PL (2025); One Hundred Ghosts, Manggha, Kraków, PL (2025); Borderland of Worlds IV. The Empire of Chlorophyll, CEP UJ, Kraków, PL (2025); South of the Border, West of the Sun, Laze Mike Gallery, Seoul, KR (2024); Arcadius. Great passions. Confrontations – Central Museum of Textile, Łódź, PL (2024); From the Ashes, Zachęta – National Gallery of Art in Warsaw, PL (2024).

Marcin Janusz’s residency is made possible with support from the Polish Cultural Institute New York, Adam Mickiewicz Institute, National Centre for Culture NCK, LETO Gallery, and FIERMAN Gallery.