Vladimir Kunz (1926-2002), Birds, 1958

Monotype. Dimensions: 51 x 42 cm
Hand signature.

Włodzimierz Kunz - Polish painter and graphic artist. He was born on July 25, 1926 in Dabrowa Tarnowska. He died on June 6, 2002 in Cracow. He is buried in the Alley of the Distinguished at the Rakowicki Cemetery.

He graduated from the Faculty of Painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow, receiving his diploma in the atelier of Hanna Rudzka-Cybisowa (1954). His works have been presented in more than 30 solo exhibitions in Poland and around the world.

Full Professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow(since 1986), Head of the Department of Lithography, Dean of the Faculty of Graphic Arts, Head of the Painting Studio at the Faculty of Painting. He served as rector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow three times (1980-1986 and 1993-1996). He retired in 1996.

He made a vivid mark in Polish artistic life as a painter, graphic artist, educator, initiator and organizer of artistic ventures at ZPAP. Expert of the Ministry of Culture and Art for contemporary art. Member of the Artistic Council of Higher Artistic Education. Member of ZPAP and active member of PAU. Chairman of the Awards Committee of the Ministry of Culture and Art. Awarded many times. Awarded the Commander's Cross of the OOP (1997). He was a scholarship holder of the Dutch government (1969). Winner of the award of the city of Cracow (1980).

He is the author of many cycles of paintings and prints, including Mediterranean Sea, Industrial Landscape, Compositions with Anecdote, Viola d'Amore, Wind Rose; he practiced monumental painting (a number of polychrome and sgraffito paintings in Düsseldorf, among others). Prof. Włodzimierz Kunz's works are in many museums at home and abroad (Wroclaw, Krakow, Warsaw, Tokyo, Guggenheim Museum in New York, Library of Congress in Washington, Havana, Nuremberg, Darmstadt) and in many private collections. Honorary citizen of Gorlice and Dabrowa Tarnowska.

He practiced easel painting, artistic printmaking and sacred wall painting. A careful observer of his surroundings and events, he found inspiration in seemingly unattractive subjects such as the cityscape, Silesian heaps, factories and elements of nature. Echoes of such events as the Peace Race, space flight and the Banja Luka earthquake appear in his graphics. His frequent travels in Europe left a mark in the quoted antique themes and revealed his fascination with the climate and culture of the Mediterranean area, of which he was an heir and creative continuator. The subjects of the prints often grew into cycles, the most famous being: Factory, Garden, Reportage, Butterfly, Icon.