Signed on the reverse on canvas g.: JERZY NOWOSIELSKI | 1988
Authenticity of the painting consulted with Andrzej Szczepaniak - art historian, curator of exhibitions, executive director of Starmach Gallery, editor, among others, of the albums Henryk Stażewski (2018), Jerzy Nowosielski (2019) published by Skira.
Image described and reproduced:
- Chris Sztyber, My Second World. My Second World. Polish Painting Collection. Polish Painting Collection, p. 143, color ill.
Krystyna Czerni wrote about Nowosielski's "green" landscapes, recalling a vacation in Ustron in 1987: I was lucky enough to observe his daily work. It was a hot summer, the mood was holiday, Sunday. The master had little paints - mostly various shades of green - and an old color calendar with views of Orthodox monasteries and Orthodox churches: the Pochaivska Lavra, the Pechersk Lavra, small Lemko shrines, large monasteries. It was sunny and green in the world, Nowosielski looked a little out the window, a little at the calendar, and - like Nikifor - led by intuition, painted little green sights.
Of course, he wouldn't be himself if he didn't find a theoretical underpinning here as well. He had just read the newly published letters of the Impressionists and wove paeans to the French painters and their color consciousness into the traditional evening theological butades. (Krystyna Czerni, History of One Friendship, in Mieczysław Porębski, Nowosielski, Krakow 2003, pp. 270-271)
Jerzy Nowosielski (Krakow 1923 - Krakow 2011) began his studies at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Krakow in 1940. In 1942 he stayed for less than a year in the St. John the Baptist Lavra near Lviv. There he studied the art of painting and the history of icons. After returning to Cracow in 1943, he re-established contacts with the circle of the future Cracow Group. After the war, he continued his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow under Prof. Eugeniusz Eibisch (1945-1947). At the First Exhibition of Modern Art in Cracow in 1948/49, he showed paintings maintained in the trend of geometric abstraction. During the years of Socialist Realism, he did not exhibit, dealing at the time with stage design and painting churches and orthodox churches. In 1955 in Lodz he presented his first solo exhibition, in 1956 he participated in the XXVIII Venice Biennale. From 1957 to 1962 he was a teacher at the State Higher School of Fine Arts in Lodz, then at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, where he taught at the Faculty of Painting until his retirement in 1993. In the second half of the 1950s he achieved a distinctive style of nudes, landscapes and figural scenes in interiors, which he owed to his fascination with icons and his experience with sacred painting. In 1976, he took up monumental works anew, producing mural paintings, Stations of the Cross and designs for stained glass windows at the Church of Divine Providence in Wesola near Warsaw (1976-1979). The artist was widely recognized as an authority on art rooted in spiritual values.
Jerzy Nowosielski died on February 21, 2011 in Krakow, Poland.
