Instytut Sztuki (Warschau) [Hrsg.]; Państwowy Instytut Sztuki (bis 1959) [Hrsg.]; Stowarzyszenie Historyków Sztuki [Hrsg.]: Biuletyn Historii Sztuki (71.2009)

SZTUKA W RZEMIOŚLE NA POWSZECHNEJ WYSTAWIE KRAJOWEJ W POZNANIU

565


Apart Rom the main show of interiors arranged by the
members of the "Ład" Artists' Cooperative, no wider
exhibiting of works of 'art in crafts' was organised at
Poznań in 1929, for which reason presenting a
comparatively synthetic picture of such representation
at the so-called "PWK" exhibition beyond the 'Pałace
of Art' is no straightforward matter.
A group of arts-and-crafts objects that it is
possible to distinguish formed part of the famishings
or exhibitions in individual parts of the overal! one.
Reference may be madę to exhibits comprising
fumiture, as well as Jacquard-loom fabrics designed
by artists from "Ład" to be placed in the
representative hall of the Ministry of Religious
Confessions and Public Enlightenment. In the
educational institutions section of the Govemment
Pavilion, achievements were displayed of a series of
teaching establishments, including the State Institute
of Handicrafts, schools of crafts and industry from
Cracow, Lwów and Poznań, the school of Timber
Industry in Zakopane and Warsaw's School of
Decorative Arts and Painting. Fumiture could be
viewed in the halls of the Justice Ministry executed
by the carpentry shops of State prisons based on the
designs of such highly-reputed artists as Jan
Koszczyc-Witkiewicz (furnishings of the judges'
studio and correction chamber), Wojciech Jastrzę-
bowski (drawing- and dining-rooms) and Karol
Maszkowski (sleeping quarters). Furthermore,
kilims, embroidery and lacework were presented by
women inmates from the State goal at Fordon outside
Bydgoszcz.
Artistic craftwork also formed an integral part of
the displays contained in the 'Women's Labour'
pavilion, in which a special section had been set
aside at the designing stage for the applied art;

kilims, embroidery work and batiks being the most
important exhibits. This exhibition competed with
another put on in the Women Landowners' Pavilion
emphasising art that was rural by origin.
The third largest exhibition of artistic craftwork
in tenns of the number of exhibits placed on display
was to be found in the Crafts Pavilion, designed by
the head architect of "PWK", Roger Sławski. This
pavilion's construction, amounting to an area of
1810 m^ was wooden and painted from the outside.
The exhibits did not relate in any way to the theories
of artists at that time (e.g. "Ład"), even though
models reproduced in the Exhibition magazine,
Ecńo PJFK, were recommended to craftsmen and
women that had been published originally in the
Municipal Industrial Museum of Cracow, as well as
in/ŁreczyP/ęłne ('Things BeautifuF), and a number
of the producers had earlier collaborated with
designer-artists. The wares placed on display in the
Crafts Pavilion were upheld in conservative forins,
revealing a particular predisposition for neo-
classicism and rococo. Alongside these historicising
works, the firm of M. Herodek's was exceptional in
displaying fumiture that had been shown at the Paris
exhibition of 1925, designed by Mieczysław
Kotarbiński.
The basie conclusion it is possible to make on
the basis of the author's analysis of the
representations of artistic crafts at the "PWK"
(beyond the Pałace of Art) is to confirm the decided
resonance between the postulations relating to
aesthetics madę by the leading creative figures of
'applied art' at that time, focused above all on "Ład"
and practice in the crafts in response to potential
clients' expectations, as well as purely artistic
tendencies.