Jerzy Mierzejewski, AUTOPORTRET

50.0 x 30.0cm - oil, canvas Provenance:

The painting belonged to one of the professors of the Lodz Film School, with whom Jerzy Mierzejewski worked at the school.



♣ to the auctioned price, in addition to other costs, a fee will be added, resulting from the right of the artist and his heirs to receive remuneration in accordance with the Act of February 4, 1994 - on Copyright and Related Rights (droit de suite)

Jerzy Mierzejewski (Krakow 13 July 1917 - Warsaw 14 June 2012) - painter and educator. He came from an artistic family: his father, Jacek Mierzejewski (1883-1925) belonged to a group of pre-war painters associated with the "Formists", his brother Andrzej (1915-1982) was also a visual artist. He studied from 1937 at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts; he did not receive his diploma from Professor Mieczyslaw Kotarbiński until 1956. After the war, he co-founded branches of the Association of Polish Visual Artists in Lublin and Lodz; he supported himself by making polychrome or ceramic architectural decorations, including in Warsaw, Poznan and Wroclaw (together with his brother, as part of "Team 12"). In the late 1940s, he took up making art films and documentaries (later also for television). In 1950 he began teaching at the PWSTiF in Lodz; he taught drawing and issues of visual art in film. He was dean of the cinematography and directing faculties, and served as the school's pro-rector from 1974-1975. He also taught at the film academy in Brussels.
Work at the university did not leave Mierzejewski much time for painting, and the search for his own creative path also took a long time. In search of inspiration, the artist traveled a lot, including to England, Austria, France, Germany and the United States. From 1975 to 1988 he worked and lived in the Netherlands. He returned to Poland in 1989.
Mierzejewski painted mainly portraits, landscapes, interiors (a frequent motif of the studio). His best-known series of paintings are "Boat" (1970s - 1990s) "Studio" and "Gardens" (1990s). His work, undoubtedly original, betrayed the influence of the art of his father, Jacek Mierzejewski.
Jerzy Mierzejewski's painterly output was not presented to the public until 1997. At that time, a retrospective exhibition was held at Warsaw's House of the Visual Artist, connected with the awarding of the Jan Cybis Prize to the artist.
[On the painter's work: Irena Jakimowicz "Jerzy Mierzejewski", 1996].