Dimensions: 98.5 x 53.5 cm
Signed with a bound monogram and dated inside the representation: 'SW 1899'
Provenance
private collection, Cracow
art auction house, October 2001
private collection, Poland
Literature
Wyspiański. Afterword, National Museum in Cracow, Cracow 2019, p. 23 (ill.)
Biography
Playwright, poet, painter and theater reformer. In 1884-85 and 1887-95 he studied at the School of Fine Arts in Cracow (he was, among other things, a pupil and collaborator of Jan Matejko) and at the Jagiellonian University. In 1890-94 he spent time abroad, mainly in Paris, where he was influenced by the art of Paul Gauguin, the Nabists and Japanese woodcut. In 1898-98 he was the graphic manager of the Cracow magazine "Life." In 1898-1905, among other things, he was active as a stage-manager at the Cracow theater. In 1906 he became a docent at the School of Fine Arts in Cracow. From 1897 he was a member of the Art Society. Stanislaw Wyspianski's favorite technique was pastel. He was also involved in graphic design (including illustrations for The Iliad, vignettes and layouts for the Cracow weekly "Life" and his own published dramas). An important place in his work, which began with his collaboration with Jan Matejko and Jozef Mehoffer on the polychrome of St. Mary's Church, was occupied by designs for stained glass and interior polychromes: for example, in the Franciscan Church in Cracow 1897-1905, in the Lviv Cathedral 1892-94 and in the Wawel Cathedral 1900-02 (not completed). Wyspiański's artistic output was dominated by portraiture, in the field of which he represented Expressionism (e.g., portraits of Kazimierz Lewandowski and Lucjan Rydel 1898) and landscape (e.g., a series of views of Kopiec Kościuszki 1904-05). Wyspiański developed stage designs for his own dramas, designs for interior decoration (e.g., of the Medical Society in Cracow), furniture and textiles, and architectural designs. He was one of the creators of the program and practice of so-called applied art in Poland, and a reformer of book graphics. His style shows both the lasting influence of Matejko, as well as vivid connections with Art Nouveau (decorativeness, characteristic flexible and whimsical lines, floral stylizations) and the influence of Impressionism.
