Voloshyn Gallery presents Afternoon of a Faun, a solo exhibition by Karol Radziszewski that reimagines Vaslav Nijinsky, one of ballet’s most radical figures, through a queer perspective. Radziszewski, known for his multidisciplinary approach, works with painting, film, photography, and installation to reconstruct histories that often exist in the margins. His work frequently revisits the Eastern European neo, Avant- Garde, teasing out its queer and feminist dimensions, and Afternoon of a Faun is no exception.

For years, Nijinsky has captivated Radziszewski’s imagination. The dancer previously appeared in Poczet, the artist’s monumental series of portraits celebrating queer figures from Central European art, science, and politics. Modelled after Jan Matejko’s Portraits of Polish Kings, a historical icon in Polish schools, Radziszewski’s version offers an alternative lineage, one that disrupts the heteronormative narrative of history.

In Afternoon of a Faun, Radziszewski constructs a painterly timeline of Nijinsky’s life, blurring biography with myth. The exhibition opens with a baptism scene in Warsaw, where the young Vaslav floats between sacred waters and paternal grasp. He remains an ambiguous figure always in motion, never sharply defined. Through stark whites, deep greens, and shadowy blacks, Radziszewski conjures an image of Nijinsky as both mystic and sensualist, an artist suspended between the physical and the ethereal.

The exhibition also explores Nijinsky’s formative years in Kyiv. As a child, he wandered the city at dusk, absorbing its riot of colours, sounds, and movements. His fascination with performance developed early, influenced by his parents’ nightly appearances on stage. Kyiv of 1893 unfolds in Radziszewski’s canvases like a dreamscape: frost-lit nights, the imposing figure of Bohdan Khmelnytsky’s monument, and a young Nijinsky lost in the glow of theatre and movement.

A key moment in the exhibition is Prince Pavlov Lvov’s Apartment, which hints at Nijinsky’s entanglement with older patrons. The dancer is portrayed in a pose reminiscent of an odalisque, idealised yet vulnerable, an object of desire. Meanwhile, Dancing for Diaghilev introduces the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev, who looms at the threshold like a vampire, ready to shape Nijinsky’s destiny. Diaghilev not only propelled Nijinsky to stardom in Paris but also orchestrated his life, his career, and, ultimately, his downfall.

Radziszewski mines Nijinsky’s repertoire for roles that subvert gender and sexuality. His reinterpretation of The Spirit of the Rose sees the dancer’s body merging with the crimson petals of his costume, a vision of passion and melancholy. Other paintings morph Nijinsky’s form mid-movement, echoing stop, motion animation: the Harlequin’s poised leg, the elongated silhouette of a Kolbe sculpture, and the horned figure from Afternoon of a Faun.

This last piece holds particular significance. In Afternoon of a Faun, Nijinsky shattered classical ballet’s rigid symmetry, embracing an animalistic, erotic physicality that scandalised audiences. His choreography referenced ancient Greek vases and Egyptian hieroglyphs, reducing movement to stark, primal gestures. It was an act of rebellion, a declaration that ballet need not be a pursuit of divine perfection—it could be raw, corporeal, and imperfectly human.

Nijinsky’s descent into mental illness is another layer of the narrative. His later years were marked by isolation, yet he continued to create compulsively, filling notebooks with circular sketches, cryptic symbols, and compulsive lines long perhaps choreographic notations mapped out in his mind. Radziszewski pays homage to this period with Untitled [after Nijinsky], an abstract work that attempts to decipher the artist’s last messages.

Ultimately, Afternoon of a Faun is as much about Nijinsky as it is about art’s revolutionary potential. Radziszewski’s work not only honours Nijinsky’s legacy but also expands the conversation around queer identity in performance history. By bridging historical research with contemporary artistic interpretation, Radziszewski challenges established narratives, emphasising the enduring impact of queer artistry in reshaping cultural memory. Radziszewski places Nijinsky within a new queer canon, weaving archival materials, reinterpretations, and personal myth, making it into a layered, multi, dimensional portrait. By reclaiming this history, Radziszewski helps to decolonize the narratives of Central and Eastern European art, liberating Nijinsky from the confines of imperial propaganda and allowing him to exist on his own terms, fluid, uncontained, and gloriously free.

Exhibition Details:Opening Reception: Saturday, March 1st, from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PMDates: March 1 - April 12, 2025Gallery Hours: Tuesday–Saturday, 11:00 AM to 5:00 PMLocation: Voloshyn Gallery, 802 NW 22nd Street, Miami, FL, US, 33127