Rocznik Historii Sztuki (43.2018)

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KATARZYNA KULPIŃSKA


18. Władysław Skoczylas, Pochód zbójników, z Teki zbójnickiej, 1920,
drzeworyt kolorowany, papier żeberkowy, 20,2 x 27,8 cm, Warszawa, Muzeum Narodowe. Fot. P. Ligier

życiu, postęp techniczny i zamiłowanie do sportu) nie zagłuszyła jednak zupełnie echa niedawnej wojny.
Świadczą o tym między innymi wydane w latach 30. teki graficzne: Legiony Polskie Leopolda Gottlieba
i Teka autolitografii artystów legionistów"19.

POLISH ARTISTIC GRAPHICS AROUND 1918.
GRAPHIC ARTISTS TOWARDS WAR, INDEPENDENCE AND A NEW REALITY
Summary
The panorama of creative attitudes, the forms of expression and the techniques present in Polish graphic art around the year
1918 was very vast. The graphic artists dedicated to realistic mode of imaging, the visionaries as well as the innovators of the first
avant-garde, searching for flesh means of expression in graphic arts worked next to one another. The artwork referring to the fights in
the fronts of World War- I, the illustrations of everyday prison camp existence, the portraits of the commanders as well as the privates
of Legiony (Leopold Gottlieb’s file of lithographs, 1916) were created simultaneously to the works by Felix Jabłczyński (who experi-
mented with various gr aphic techniques, but also referr ed the curr ent political situation in his works) or the 1st file of lithographs, Bożki
Słowiańskie [Slavic Idols] (1918), by Zofia Stryjeńska. Between 1917 and 1921, the artists of the first avant-garde (from Formiści and
Bunt art groups) who practiced graphic arts continued their endeavours in searching for a new form, initiated several years earlier. In
1918, Władysław Skoczylas, the author of a woodcut Święty Boże (Wojna) [Holy God (War)] from 1916, a work which opened a new
chapter in the history of Polish woodcut, moved permanently to Warsaw. Regaining of national independence and shaping the borders
of the Second Republic was mirrored in symbolic lithographs by Felicjan S. Kowarski, dating around 1921.
Around 1918, the explorations within graphic arts made by the artists from Krakow and Warsaw were enhanced by some new
centres, up to then outermost realm of the map of art. One of such places was Toruń, where, in 1920, Konfrateria Toruńska [Toruń Con-
fraternity] was established. Its members practiced artistic and functional graphic art as well. One of them, Felicjan S. Kowar ski, founded
Artistic-Graphic Workshop “Sztuka”. In 1919 in Poznań, the State School of Decorative Arts and Art Industry was established (with the
graphic arts department); in 1920 on Bydgoszcz the State School of Art Industry (with Karol Mondral as its graphic arts instructor).
In 1919, the Faculty of Fine Arts at Vilnius Batory University created the Studio of Applied Arts (with Decorations and Graphic Arts
Studios). The same year; the Association of Polish Graphic Artists, functioning nationwide, was founded.
The article signals the wealth of initiatives as well as the formal and ideological diversity of graphic works created around 1918,
those referring to the war- and independence issues as well as those aimed at perfecting the technique, the novelty of forni, and those
revealing certain style-genic aspirations. The author attempts to answer the question of the place of creative (and functional) gr aphic arts
in the first year s of the reborn Polish state and indicates which concepts (present around 1918) lay at the foundation of the unprecedented
blossoming of graphic arts that occurr ed the Second Polish Republic.
transl. Katarzyna Kulpińska

79 Teka litografii Gottlieba została wydana ponownie przez Główną Księgarnię Wojskową w Warszawie w 1936 r., 20 lat po
pierwszym wydaniu; zbiorową Tekę autolitografii artystów legionistów wydano w Krakowie w 1934 r., w dwudziestolecie zbrojnego
czynu legionów 1914-1934.