Józef Czapski (1896 Prague - 1993 Maisons-Laffitte), Bathing

ink, watercolor, 16 x 10 cm in light passe-partout



Writer, critic, soldier, co-founder of the Parisian "Culture", painter - one of the co-founders of the Paris Committee, a grouping whose work influenced the art of Polish painters for half a century. After graduating from high school in 1915, he began studying law. After the outbreak of World War I, he was drafted into the army, but, because of his pacifist views, he interrupted his military service and enrolled in the School of Fine Arts in Warsaw. He returned to the army with a mission to search for comrades-in-arms missing in Russia - "Krechoviaks"- whom the Bolsheviks executed on the Russian-Finnish border. He participated in the Polish-Soviet War in 1919-1920, serving in the armored train "Bold" in the 1st Krechowiecki Cavalry Regiment. In 1923-1924 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow. In 1924, together with a group of students of Jozef Pankiewicz, forming the so-called Paris Committee, he went to Paris for further studies, where he stayed until 1931. Upon his return to Poland, he painted intensively, participated in exhibitions and wrote on the subject of art. In 1939, Jozef Czapski was drafted into the army, was taken prisoner by the Soviet Union and imprisoned along with other Polish soldiers and officers by the Red Army. Freed from captivity, he joined the Anders Army and from 1941 to 1942 led the search for officers and soldiers imprisoned and missing in the USSR. After 1944 he lived permanently in Maisons-Laffitte near Paris. He was one of the founders of the monthly magazine "Culture." As a writer, he published, among others, Oldobiel Memories, On Inhuman Earth and numerous essays on art. He painted landscapes, still lifes, interiors and, less frequently, portraits. In the 1980s and 1990s, the artist's paintings and drawings were exhibited several times in Krakow, Warsaw, and Poznan.