Jan Bielinski and the aesthetics of the supposedly unspectacular

In his black and white photographs, Jan Bielinski seeks out the harmonious and subtle in the banalities of everyday life. He is currently showing his work for the first time in his adopted home town at the Gleis 4 gallery on the main platform of Zug railway station.

Normal everyday life in urban areas is full of the ubiquitous, even the banal, to which the majority of people pay little attention. Zug-based photographer Jan Bielinski finds the content for his works in black and white in precisely this supposedly unspectacular environment, however - with a keen eye, and a pronounced sense for aesthetics and content with subtle messages.

They are mostly snapshots, sometimes born out of chance, but always carefully captured and condensed to the essentials. People - whether in motion or at rest, as the main motif or as background objects - almost always play a role in Bielinski's pictures. Everything, even the superficially static, blossoms into vibrancy through components such as focus, angle, contrast, light and shadow.

While the focus is primarily on the urban, the photographer sometimes also finds suitable motifs in rural surroundings, for example, when travelling. Jan Bielinski always remains a silent observer, whereby he emphasises discretion - voyeurism is far from his mind, he says, because whenever possible he seeks personal contact with the people in his pictures.

‘I rarely leave the house without a small camera in my trouser pocket,’ he says, and his collection now comprises around 50,000 images. Photography has always been a part of his life. After the millennium, the native of eastern Switzerland intensified his self-taught craft, and this has become a main part of his everyday life since his retirement. There was previously little time left for photography during his intensive professional years in the field of communication and marketing.

Jan Bielinski has worked exclusively with the black and white technique as a stylistic device for around ten years. His works often incorporate political statements or socially critical aspects metaphorically, and are usually revealed to the viewer without further explanation as he/she quietly examines the work.

Jan Bielinski focusses on black and white photography and the events of everyday life. He is currently exhibiting at the Gleis 4 gallery at Zug railway station.
Light and shadow - two central aspects that characterise and distinguish Jan Bielinski's work. 
Some of the subjects convey subtle messages     Photos: Stefan Kaiser 
The gallery owners Melanie and Konrad Breznik    Photo: Matthias Jurt

Exhibitions in Moscow and London
Jan Bielinski's practised eye for the spectacular in the unspectacular has repeatedly aroused international interest: his photographic works have been exhibited in the Multimedia Art Museum in Moscow and in the residence of the Swiss ambassador in London, among others. With the current solo exhibition at Galerie Gleis 4 at Zug railway station, Bielinski is making his debut in his adopted home, where he settled eight years ago. The selected works are hung in pairs and relate to each other in terms of content or composition. His exhibition ‘Between Light and Shade’ at Zug railway station runs until the end of March.

The SBB have again extended the temporary rental contract 
Gallery owners Konrad and Melanie Breznik opened Gleis 4, their gallery for contemporary art on the main platform of Zug railway station next to the Coop-to-go, in August 2024 as an interim use after the previous tenant - a hairdressing salon - moved out. ‘We were looking for a gallery space last year and simply enquired by the SBB,’ says Melanie Breznik looking back. ‘That's how the opportunity at Zug railway station came about.’

The temporary rental contract was initially limited to two months, but was then extended until March 2025. As the planning process with the fixed tenant successor has been further delayed, however, the SBB offered to extend the interim use once again for the Brezniks - until September 2025, and from then on with a shop window display until the end of the year, while the space behind it is remodelled for the new tenants.

The gallery owners are delighted. Konrad Breznik: ‘People react with surprise and interest to the fact that there is art right next to a platform. Numerous contacts and conversations have been made in this short time.’ In general, the gallery seems to arouse the curiosity of train travellers. ‘We've never had to clean display windows as often as we do here at the station,’ says the gallery owner, laughing. ‘That's a good sign, because we explicitly want to bring art and people together.’

Galerie Gleis 4 also found a permanent location last November, in the premises of the former Oswald perfumery on the Bundesplatz in Zug, for the time after the upcoming building renovation. Nevertheless, the Brezniks want to stick to the concept of interim utilisation and continue to be present in changing spaces in the canton and beyond.

‘Between Light and Shade’, photographs by Jan Bielinski in the Gleis 4 gallery at Zug railway station, until Saturday, 29th March.