Kobas Laksa

Portraits of the Chairmen of the 500 List (2009)

www.kbx.pl Program: Vernissage     Pavilion A     Thursday (18.03) 07:00 p.m.   Meeting with the artists     Pavilion A   Friday (19.03) 05:00 p.m.

Kobas Laksa – born in 1971 in Białystok. He graduated from The Academy of Fine Arts in Poznań. He is a director and a script writer of short films, a clip-maker (he made clips for such bands as i.a. Abradab, Plastic), and a photographer-editor.

Portraits of the 500 list is a promotional project of Rzeczpospolita newspaper, accompanying the traditional rank of the greatest Polish enterprises, The 500 list. The chairmen of the biggest Polish enterprises, who took part in the project, were portrayed by two artists: Kobas Laksa and Ewa Łowyż. The interviews with the chairmen were presented in the special album issue.
The premiere of Portraits of the 500 list took place during The 500 list Gala in spring 2009. The leading motif of Portraits… was leadership, including the role of a leader, creation and motivation of teams, building the strategies basing on values, as this is what makes a business successful. Photo sessions were quite short. The artists had basic information about the people to be portrayed, read the interviews, but their real-life contact with chairmen was short. Each session took less than an hour. The portraits of the chairmen lack anecdotes and ornaments, which usually take our eyes off the personality of the person portrayed. What counts here is the nature captured in a simple gesture and glance.