Years into our friendship, I still gasp when I see Marta’s work. The way she can conjure intense sophistication and sensuality out of such airy looseness seems to defy the laws that govern art and design. Even her personality is law-defying: charismatic and assertive in most ways, she nevertheless exudes a low-key, catlike manner. Most people with much to say don’t make great listeners, yet she is both.
As an artist, Marta is bold with form and subtle with meaning. Wabi-sabi; less is more; ragged edges; miles of white space. Her signature moves pull together illustration, freestyle calligraphy, printmaking, ink work, and collage. The result has layers, literally and metaphorically, which invite careful study, but they don’t demand it. Lovely pictures with a surprising amount of edge, often combined with text. Read into them or don’t, they’re too cool to care. Whimsically, they challenge the idea that art has to be either/or. Contemplative? Decorative? Marta is off on her own somewhere, armed with a sketchbook and a glass of wine, laughing at this outdated dichotomy.
As a designer, Marta conveys meaning with clarity, even when concepts are subtle or complex. Her work in branding and publishing often deploys her loopy and abstracted drawings, graceful penmanship, and confident eye for composition, but here Marta’s style is a means to an end, in service to the message.
To see Marta’s design work, check out the book covers she designs for the publishing house Filtry, whose logo and branding is also Marta’s own. (That eye you think you see in the brandmark? It comes to life in the lines of the arched structures of Warsaw’s “Filtry”—the city’s famous red-brick waterworks that lent inspiration to the brand.) Or have a look at Marta’s covers, layouts, and illustrations for the wine quarterly Ferment. Though the magazine’s logo is by a different designer, most everything else has Marta’s special touch.
For a glimpse of Marta’s art, have a peek at some pages from a sketchbook she filled not long ago. What I do when I’m up late at night, she titled it. Innocent words, it would seem, yet they sure invite many questions.
For more of Marta’s work visit her online at konarzewska.pl or on Instagram.
Note: Photographing Marta’s art books was a privilege and a surprisingly tough challenge. Getting that background to look neutral was hard enough, but the truly humbling experience concerned nudging everything just so in post-production to get the pages to wind up in the same part of the frame. I have a long way to go with my studio-style photography. And I’m ready to admit that yes, I do need that tripod.