Zygmunt Waliszewski, VIEW FROM MEAUX, 1927

29,0 x 61,0cm - oil, canvas signed p.d.: Z. Waliszewski

On the reverse, on the canvas, an illegible pencil inscription and a sheet of paper with the inscription: Zygmunt Waliszewski (1897-1936) | French Landscape, ol/pł ca. 1930 | Provence - Lviv collection | purchased in 2012; in addition, on the lower slat of the frame, an auction sticker from Agra-Art dated 2019.



The painting was in a private collection in Lviv, where it ended up before World War II. The last time its presence there was recorded in 1979. Since then, the fate of the painting was unknown, and it was not possible to determine its place of storage. Its previous owners living in Lviv refused any contact with Polish art historians.

When the first monographic exhibition of the artist and an accompanying catalog with a full inventory of works were being prepared at the National Museum in Warsaw in 1999, the painting View from Meaux was noted in section III, entitled Works lost and of currently undetermined ownership. A black-and-white photograph of it was also included.



The painting described and reproduced:
- "Voice of the Artists" 1937, no. 1 - 7, p. 21, il;
- H. Bartnicka-Górska, A. Prugar-Myślik, Zygmunt Waliszewski 1897-1936, Monographic exhibition, May-July 1999, MNW, Warsaw 1999, cat. p. 190, item III/ 17, il. s. 191.

Zygmunt Waliszewski (St. Petersburg 1897 - Krakow 1936) painter, stage designer, illustrator. Showing great artistic talent from childhood, he began his artistic education at an early age at the Painting and Drawing Courses conducted by Nikolai Sklifasovsky and Boris Fogel, first in Batumi and then in Tiflis. As a 13-year-old boy he had his first exhibition entitled. "Miracle Child." During the First World War he joined the army and fought on the northern front. From the front came a number of drawing sketches and portraits of soldiers, now in the collection of the MNW. Wounded, he underwent a period of convalescence in Moscow, developing friendships with the art bohemia there. He returned to Tbilisi and when Georgia proclaimed independence in 1918, Valiszewski was active among a group of Futurists gathered in the so-called "University 41." At that time he made a formally avant-garde curtain for the State Opera Theater in Tbilisi. The Bolshevik threat caused the artist to leave for Poland, where in 1921 he entered the Krakow Academy of Fine Arts in the studio of Wojciech Weiss and then Jozef Pankiewicz. He established contact with the Krakow avant-garde, wrote theoretical treatises, designed scenery and costumes for plays, and made the painting decorations of the Futurists' club room "Nutmeg." In 1924 he left with a group of students forming the so-called "Paris Committee" for further study in Paris, where Prof. J. Pankiewicz organized a branch of the Cracow university. The problem of color dominated his works and Waliszewski became one of the most prominent representatives of this trend in Polish art of the 20-year interwar period. Heavily ill, having had his legs amputated, he returned to Poland in 1930. Here he created large compositions such as Island of Love, a series of Feasts inspired by the work of Veronese, numerous landscapes and still lifes counted among his most valuable works. He is the author of the Wawel Castle plafond in Kurza Stopka. In addition, he created caricatures, humorous scenes and designed posters. He presented his works at exhibitions at home and abroad, including in Paris (1930), Geneva (1931), Krakow (1932), Warsaw (1930, 1933) and at the International Biennale in Venice (1934). His works are held by, among others, National Museums in Warsaw, Cracow, Poznan, Szczecin, the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. A large group of drawings and watercolors is in the Museum of Georgian Art in Tbilisi and in private collections there. In 1999, the National Museum in Warsaw hosted his monographic exhibition