Szymon Kobylarz’s works combine fiction and reality. These two drawings – the artist refers to them as “plain cartoons” – have a mysterious denominator in common. They show two musicians who pursued different approaches and came from different backgrounds, yet shared similar fates. Both of them died young, shortly after their respective careers had begun.

The restless itinerant musician Robert Johnson, born in Mississippi in 1911, was a legendary figure, “partly truth and partly fiction” (Kris Kristofferson). His expressive handling of the guitar with the bottleneck and his compositional inventiveness made him one of the most influential blues musicians, and his pieces inspired such famous rock groups as the Rolling Stones, The Cream, or Led Zeppelin. That his music, which tells both about hellhounds and a pact between a guitarist and the devil, has survived in Johnson’s own interpretation is owing to two sessions that took place in 1934 and in the course of which the man who later was to be referred to as “King of the Delta Blues” recorded several dozens of songs. Then he once again vanished in a haze of anecdotes primarily fuelled by his excessive lifestyle. He died in 1938 and is said to have been poisoned by a jealous husband. It is likely, however, that he succumbed to syphilis. Kobylarz did not have much choice when he was looking for a model on which he could rely for his drawing, for there exists only a single photograph, showing Johnson wearing a perky hat. It has long become a kind of devotional image from the early history of black music.

The career of the pianist and composer Krzysztof Komeda (1931–1969), who was considered a prodigy in Poland and evolved into an idol of the young jazz generation, did not end with death either. Thanks to the intense lyricism of his cool compositions, which thrive on gaps and pauses and were mainly made popular via the cinema, Komeda became a huge inspiration for the Polish jazz scene. He gained international fame for his soundtrack of Roman Polanski’s first Hollywood film, Rosemary’s Baby. Komeda was 38 years old when he died of a cerebral hemorrhage in the wake of an accident in Los Angeles, the circumstances of which have remained unclear. This incident is alluded to by the work’s title, Krwiak (meaning hematoma in English).

The technique of collage lends additional depth to these two drawings, whose almost photorealistic rendering accounts for their oppressive presence. In these portraits, Kobylarz plays with disclosure and disguise, and it seems as if the artist retrieved the two fabled musicians from the realm of death. After all, Robert Johnson was said to have concluded a deal with the devil, and Krzysztof Komeda, through his involvement in Rosemary’s Baby, is likewise associated with the diabolic and uncanny.

Wolfgang Kos, Heike Maier-Rieper, 2011 (translation: Wolfgang Astelbauer)