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Jerzy Fober, “Scourging”, 1990 – expressive contemporary wooden sculpture of the Passion
Jerzy Fober’s sculpture “Scourging” (1990) is a moving example of contemporary sacred sculpture in which a massive tree trunk becomes the starting point for a meditation on suffering and sacrifice. From the block emerges a fragment of a human body – a tense torso and hands raised in a gesture of prayer. The smoothly carved, almost vulnerable figure still appears bound to the trunk, as if it had not been fully released from the wood, highlighting the connection between the human body and the weight of matter and pain.
Two rough wooden sections seem to imprison the figure. Their surfaces are marked by deep grooves into which pieces of rope have been embedded. These incisions, emphasised with dark red polychromy, evoke wounds and lash marks, directly alluding to the traditional iconography of the scourging. The contrast between the delicately modelled torso and the raw, brutally cut timber intensifies the dramatic impact of the work.
The raised hands – somewhere between prayer, desperate plea and surrender – introduce a strong spiritual dimension, referring to the Passion of Christ and the long tradition of Passion imagery in Christian art. Jerzy Fober’s “Scourging” can be read both as a contemporary reinterpretation of a biblical scene and as a universal metaphor of human suffering inscribed in the very fabric of the world. It stands as an important work within modern Polish religious sculpture.
Keywords: Jerzy Fober “Scourging” sculpture, contemporary sacred art, Polish wooden figurative sculpture, Passion of Christ in sculpture, polychrome religious sculpture, modern Christian art.
