Włodzimierz Tetmajer (1862 Harklowa - 1923 Kraków), In front of Tetmajerowka

oil, doubled canvas 115.5 × 81 cm
Signed p. d.: "W.T."

On the transverse strip of the painting loom a note (stamp, ink): "Painting by Włodzimierz Tetmajer/Sold on 19/10 1935 by/Michał Dylski |MICHAŁ DYLSKI/The Court Appraiser |Lwów, Wałowa 21 Tel. 30-54 |Dylski On the back, p.d. in black oil: PAINTING CONSERVED/ ART. CZAJKOWSKI |LEONARD PAINTER IN 1972.
The featured painting shows the famous Tetmajerowka, where Włodzimierz Tetmajer lived with his family. In 1890 Włodzimierz married Anna Mikołajczykówna, daughter of a peasant from Bronowice, which caused a stormy scandal in Krakow and preceded by exactly 10 years the next famous wedding of Lucjan Rydel with Jadwiga (Anna's wife's sister). Rydel's wedding, which was just in the Tetmajers' house, was depicted in the drama "The Wedding" by Stanislaw Wyspianski and Tetmajer himself was immortalized in it as the Host.
On the other hand, Tetmajer's marriage itself was "something spontaneous, bold born from the heart and from the eyes." The wedding of the sixteen-year-old maiden and the young artist took place on August 11, 1890. Wanting to hide this fact from his father and stepmother, fearing their opposition, Vladimir waited until they left for the summer to Zakopane. The ceremony was attended by the painter's closest friends and the entire village of Bronowice. This noble-peasant wedding caused a great sensation. "Everyone, all of Krakow turned away from me," Tetmajer wrote to a friend. - I would care less, I don't care about this whole bunch of lousy philistines, but what's worse, they harm me at every step. I do not understand why this fact, because it is not completely average, that I have done something that an ordinary philistine will not do, causes such fierce hatred towards me of the whole ancient city." (M. Czapska-Michalik, Włodzimierz Tetmajer, Edipresse 2007, p.57). The Tetmajers had six daughters and two sons. The house itself was simply teeming with life:
"My God! You alone can count how much humor poured out of heads and wine from flasks within these walls! But we made raids on this house at noon, evening, night. How many facets burst here, how many cheers shot up at the arrival of noble guests. (...) There was a murmur of animus, the temper of youth was angry, there was a scroll, as perhaps nowhere else, of an unadulterated, indigenous tone of Slavic custom, and Tetmajerowska everywhere and always, on every occasion, a thread of cultural level. Even in hulking drunkenness (A. Grzymała-
-Siedlecki). After the death of her husband, Anna Tetmajerowa remained in the house, eventually Tetmajerowka fell to her daughter Klementyna" (Czapska-Michalik, Włodzimierz Tetmajer, Edipresse 2007, p.61)