Art Chowder March | April 2018, Issue 14 | Page 43

The event took place during the reign of
Sigismund I the Old (1467-1548, reigned
1506-1548). Another painting of that
period shows a young Sigismund I with
his even younger and beloved Barbara of
Hungary (1495-1515). They were a pair
of star-crossed lovers, a Slavic Romeo
and Juliet with a twist. Their marriage
is recorded as happy and she bore him
children before her early death.
Władysław Czachórski (1850-1911)
Polish artist Władysław Czachórski received artistic training at the School of Fine Arts in
Warsaw, the Dresden Academy of Fine Art, and the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, from
1869-1873, where he studied under Hermann Anschütz, who had been one of Matejko’s
teachers some dozen years before. Upon his graduation he received the Grand Silver
Medal and later became a member of the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin.
Czachórski’s subjects included landscape, still life, portraiture, and Shakespearean
themes, but he was most admired for what could be called exquisite pictorial confections:
highly realistic depictions of beautiful young women in lavishly detailed interiors.
Matejko’s monumental Battle of
Grunwald celebrates the victory of the
allied Kingdom of Poland and the Grand
Duchy of Lithuania, over the German
Teutonic Order of Knights in 1410—one
of Poland’s greatest military victories.
During World War II, when the Nazis
sought to destroy all artifacts of Polish
culture, Joseph Goebbels offered a
bounty of 10 million marks ($4,000,000)
for the painting. It remained hidden for
the duration of the war.
Władysław Czachórski (1850-1911)
A Moment of Repose
1890
oil on canvas
21 1/2 x 29”
location unknown
Władysław Czachórski (1850-1911)
The Blossom of Youth
1898
oil on panel
30 x 40.9 cm. (11.8 x 16.1 in.)
location unknown
Jan Matejko (1838-1893)
The Battle of Grunwald
1878
Oil on canvas
426 cm (167.7 in). Width: 987 cm (388.6 in)
National Museum, Warsaw
March | April 2018
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