Tadeusz Styka (1889 Kielce-1954 New York), Portrait of Wanda Styka with her sons Andrzej and Juliusz

oil, canvas, 117 × 90 cm

Coming from a family with painting traditions, Tadeusz Styka became famous as an outstanding portraitist, both in Europe and the United States. His gallery of portraits included images of well-known personalities from the world of politics, culture, such as: Pola Negri, Ignacy Paderewski, Maurice Maeterlinck, Wladyslaw Anders, Leo Tolstoy, as well as anonymous beautiful models, with flirtatious looks and wide smiles. Thaddeus also portrayed images from his circle of loved ones on many occasions in his work. Famous portraits include those of his father, Jan, his brother, Adam, and his beloved daughter, Wanda. The presented family portrait of Tadeusz's brother Adam's wife, Wanda with her sons Andrzej and Juliusz, is also such an example. The whole composition captured has a casual, even intimate character. The poses of both Wanda and her two sons are natural, unforced. The viewer can almost get the impression of sharing their private moments with them. The composition shows the characteristic features of Tadeusz's painting, about which critics wrote: "The subtlety of the drawing, the almost pastel softness and delicacy in grasping the subject - this is what brings Tadeusz Styka closer to the models he paints - this is what predestines him as a painter of salon madonnas." ("From Lodz Exhibitions. Adam and Tadeusz Styka in the Golden Room of the Grand-Hotel," in "Republika" No. 120, dated May 3, 1934).
Adam Styka met his future wife Wanda in Poland. In April 1921, after several months of mostly correspondence acquaintance, the couple married. Wanda Styka's family came from the Szydłowiec area. Her father Edmund Engemann was a member of the town council and owned a brewery and a castle in Szydłowiec. Edmund and his wife, Julia (née Machlejd), had two daughters, Zofia (1893-1958) and Wanda (1900-1994).
Mr. and Mrs. Styka, along with their sons Andrzej, born in 1922, and Juliusz, who was one year younger, lived in Paris at first, in the artist's studio on Place Pigalle. From there, they traveled every year to North Africa - an oriental land providing endless inspiration in Adam's painting work.
In 1932, the couple returned to Poland. They settled in Konstancin, in the villa "Urocza", at 11 Piotra Skargi St. Here was the artistic studio of the famous orientalist. The outbreak of World War II found the family in the country. As Wanda herself recalls, "Adaś did not stop painting throughout the occupation. For him, work was a response to the destruction of war and the gehenna of civilian humanity. We ourselves experienced the greatest shock on our lives - the arrest and later execution of our younger son, Julisz" (Czesław Czapliński, "The Saga of the Styka Family," New York 1988, p. 154.)
After the war ended, Adam, along with Wanda and Andrzej, left for Paris. However, the difficult situation in post-war Paris decided the Styks to leave in 1948 at the invitation of Tadeusz to the United States, where they stayed permanently.