Jan Wiktor Sienkiewicz In The Shade of Oblivion
about the pre-war creative output of Wanda Chelmonska (1891-1971)
History of art has given us numerous examples of how difficult it is to stand equal with the father whose famous name one has inherited, even if the successors talent and artistic achievements are equally great, and it might seem just as important for the next tens of years of the history of painting.
Wanda Chelmonskas creativity, although sharing her fathers love for the Polish folk people and folk culture, by no means resembles that of the great painters. The heiress to the famous surname, the daughter of Jozef Chelmonski, only seemingly may be said to have had the road to her own career paved. Any attempt to critically assess her creative output was bound, at a certain stage, to juxtapose and compare her with father, to assume the same measure placing side by side two clearly different artistic individuals. Obviously no such comparison should be drawn here, at least for the sake of the fact that Wanda Chelmonska was never her fathers student. He himself recognised a talent in his child and wanted its qualities to be respected and it was his desire for the talent to develop in its own natural way. So he was not her master.
However, it is not for the fathers gift and achievements in the history of Polish painting that Wanda Chelmonskas creativity has come to be forgotten. It was never marked so strongly as
to gain its own standing as an important phenomenon in Polish art. The artist had all the potential to become a visible part of the XX c. Polish painting history already before the World War II. It never happened, though. Her creativity preceding the war and following it clearly falls into two distinct periods, two separate lives where the former had been unnaturally interrupted at the peak of its development and the latter, the post-war one, was given no mention.
Wanda Chelmonska was born in Warsaw on 13 January 1891, as the fourth daughter of Jozef Chelmonski (1849-1914). From early childhood she grew up in the atmosphere of famous painters great art her father and her uncle Wladyslaw Slewinski (1854-1918). In Warsaw she graduated from all- girls secondary school, the so-called Tolwinskis School, where she specialized in the humanities. In 1913, after her fathers death, as a young art student she went to Paris intending to take up studying art. She began the studies in 1914 having passed a competition examination to the Parisian LAcademie des Beaux Artes. She acquired the knowledge of painting simultaneously in the studios of distinguished painters and theoreticians of art Maurice Deniss, the nabist and creator of symbolic stylized figural compositions in subdued colours, and Andre Lhotes, the critic and theoretician of art, and above all the maker of cubist like landscapes, still lifes and figural scenes.
The period before the outbreak of World War II was quite promising for the young artists career. However, the German occupation forced Chelmonska to leave Poznan where she had lived until about 1923. With the aid of The Polish Red Cross Organization she found shelter, during the time of the nazi occupation, in Gorczyce estate situated between Opatow Kielecki province and Ostrowiec Swietokrzyski. The beauty of the surrounding countryside, the landscapes dotted with monuments of architecture particularly the Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque churches, as well as the secular ones, all inspired her to an intensive creative effort as if to counteract the horrors of the war. Chelmonska remained in the Kielce province until 1945. This hard period being gone, it might seem that nothing worse could have happened in the artists life. All hope in vain. In no way was she able to accept and function in the post-war communist Poland. The context of physical and psychological imprisonment, the inability to travel freely around Europe, the lack of "the Parisian change" were all unbearable to Chelmonska, which in effect severely restrained her artistic creativity and greatly reduced her artistic outcome in the whole post-war period. In the 50s, back in Poznan, Chelmonska took up a teaching position in secondary and university education.
Today, in the last year of the second millenium, one does not find the name of Wanda Chelmonska in works on the history of XX c. Polish art, painting in particular, among the names of artists who are considered by the Polish historians of art to be important for the history of Polish painting. The basic study of the Polish painting history, "The Contemporary Polish Painting", by Tadeusz Dobrowolski gives only a brief mention of the painters name placing it, not justly so, among " little known and not always outstanding painters ".
One should remember, however, that before World War II the artists position and the meaning of her increasingly greater creative output, seen in the eyes of then contemporary critics, were beginning to be more and more visible on the Polish art scene.
The promising talent of Wanda Chelmonska was broadly commented on in Polish and French papers already after her first Paris exhibitions. Following the collective exhibition held by "the recently revived Polish Artistic-Literary Association" in Paris in 1915 the papers wrote that " Lola Rappportownas and Chelmonskas paintings prove that both artists have a brilliant future ahead of them, provided they do some hard work on their drawing techniques"
The pre-war Paris absorbed Chelmonska with its energy and the vibrant artistic life. The artist was engrossed in the international atmosphere of the world artistic capital and created profusely. Only after 14 years from the time of her first exhibition in Paris did Chelmonska formally become part of the Polish artistic circles. In 1928 she joined the group of Polish artists assembled around the sculptor August Zamoyski, who that year formed an association called "Cercle des Artistes Polonais a Paris", grouping about thirty artists who collectively presented their works to the Paris audience.
The artist was quickly "fished out" by the Polish and French critics. The Polish press reported that the artist had already established her "artistic brand" after the sequence of successes in France. The question often raised was whether Chelmonskas creativity was gaining popularity in France thanks to being so very Parisian or was it because of principles independent of the passing fashions?
In 1931 Stefania Podhorska-Okolow wrote, that Chelmonska, in a modern fashion, and in a style characteristically Parisian, encloses the Polish temperament in her works. She is a Parisian when she paints other Parisian women on such canvases as "In a box", "In a restaurant", or "The Musette Ball". The first canvas mentioned here, " lightly composed, where the rhythm of the scale of shades of red plays the splendidly conceived harmonies and the level of technique reaches the top in her mastery of handling the material. The painting is Parisian deeply Parisian but its soul and colour belong to Wanda Chelmonska". Not to the Parisian Wanda Chelmonska, but to the Polish one, in whose soul Polish folk culture and tradition were deeply rooted.
Without doubt, Chelmonska found in herself and transferred onto the canvases the native character and feature, especially when painting such compositions as "The Corpus Christi", "The Procession", "The Wedding in the Poznan Region", "Old Women Before the Altar" or "Old Women in the Rain".
It clearly appears from the paintings how much she loved the life in its most intensive and colourful aspects. It was with the utmost mastery that she managed to capture the dynamics of movement, as exemplified by the dancing scenes showing a group of folk people swirling briskly in a village inn, or by numerous compositions of church holiday processions with a priest raising a monstrance surrounded by singing crowds, rows of peasants heads bent in humble ecstasy before the priest celebrating the holy mass, and finally, in the scenes from a village church or a brightly lit parish church in Jasnogora
The subject matter and the atmosphere of the paintings fascinated the critics. One of her exhibitions received the following commentaries: " In the very heart of Paris, amongst the hubbub and commotion of the great capital city Wanda Chelmonskas exhibition suddenly takes the viewer to the flamboyant scenery of a Polish village. Humble is the crowd engrossed in prayer kneeling before the Holy Sacrament, the peasant girls ruddy cheeks bloom like wild poppy flowers among white peasants overcoats, colourful headscarves and striped skirts. The singing crowds of young lads and lasses, women and respectable greying farmers proceed in the procession, carrying a gaily flapping gonfalon, with the priest dressed in golden chasuble, blessing the Monstrance to the people, the swaying crops on fields and grey walls of city mansions".
These works demonstrate very clearly how she was shaped, being influenced by the artistic culture of the West, into assuming an interesting, non Polish approach towards phenomena considered commonplace and rather ordinary by us, the Polish. Chelmonska treats folk costumes, the movement of the crowd or hieratic dignity as matters of exotic character. However, the innate, strictly Polish sense of humour, the immediacy of impressions and the wide range of themes decide about the Polish quality of this rich and juicy talent".
Based on the scarce photographic documentation that we have today of the pre-war works by Chelmonska, it can be said that her canvases dating back from the 20s and 30s had the characteristic flow and certainty of the texture, original compositional renderings as well as the tendency to play up the decorative role of colour. It is the colour that constitutes the basic, the essential element of Chelmonskas art. The tonality of her paintings is not always warm, regardless of what kind of colours she used, whether they were luminous, quiet or bright reds or more subdued shades of dark or black greens and browns. Chelmonska ravished in the colour and plunged deep into "the ocean of rainbow-like vibrations of light". Jan Mrozinski comments: " the reaction of her temperament is the strongest towards colour and colouring is her main purpose.
Even the titles of some of her paintings relate to colours, such as "The Black Portrait" or "The Pink Portrait". Generally the artists compositions are thought out as a set of colour patches enclosed by a contour. When painting a face " the colour of cheeks, hair, eyebrows and eyes is understood essentially as the colour itself. The eyes are marked by the artist in the form of a big patch, of a clearly defined colour, similarly to the shades on the face which are rendered by a specifically selected colour corresponding to the rest of lightened and coloured fragments".
It was also E. Woroniecki who emphasized Wanda Chelmonskas painting abilities. "She doesnt use the manner of the impressionists who sketched a painting in a few stronger patches, disregarding the drawing. The artist (also) avoids the academic rigidity, she separates and with an easy manner defines the colour patches, being able to arrive at characteristic features of figures and faces. She proves her mastery in a particularly difficult composition of group arrangements. With equal skill she approaches compositions of movement. Her "Dances in the village inn" is an example of an outstanding rendering of the Polish national dynamism and energetic temperament".
Wanda Chelmonska limited thus her expression concerning her figures only to "what strikes her painting imagination what grips attention in its own spiritually-visual impressionism by means of a patch, a drawing, a colour, or a light, what she can really see, at times with the eye of a master, marking it with a broad gesture suitable for the synthetic quality of her compositions. Therefore, every figure or object, be it a house, a candle in a church, a lamp in a folk scene, the whiteness of girls or their black shoes are all tersely defined".
The analysis of other, still existing, works by Chelmonska, shows how those early compositions, originally full of swing, lose their dynamism in the course of time. The artist left behind the sensual passion for colour, so typical of her 1920s works and in 1930s took a step up, reaching what might be considered as a higher level in her compositions. The vivid and rich range of colours gained " a spiritual dimension" and underwent transformation into a sophisticated, subtle sphere. The dynamic quality of the compositions of folk crowds, dances and processions became more subdued as the artist concentrated more on the studies of heads, especially those of peasant women. Almost unnoticeably the idyllic mood now became in some compositions the expression of deep pain, as exemplified by the painting "Mother with the child".
These works cannot be viewed irrespectively of the education which young Chelmonska gained during her studies at the Paris Academy. Such oil paintings as "The Women in the Park", "The Theatre Box" or "Yvonne a portrait of a Parisian woman" bear certain technical qualities characteristic of Andre Lhot, for example, a largely geometricized drawing, rhythmic composition and a flat colour patch. In other works such as "The peasant women in church" or the aforementioned "Mother with her child" Chelmonska came closer, through the thematic similarity, to her second master Maurice Denis who was interested in the revival of sacred art, producing, at the same time, a lot of portraits, landscapes and the genre scenes.
At the beginning of the 1930s one can observe a growing thematic variety in Chelmonskas creativity. Besides the well known themes of processions with their magnificent colouring, whose lofty mood was captured by the solemn golden shades, or the characteristically naive figures of girls, there appeared other themes such as the Polish sea, the Paris scenes, still lifes or more and more often the interiors of the Pomerania churches. And it is difficult to say which of them are better in terms of composition and technique.
The most interesting work seems to be "The Altar of Virgin Mary in Torun. It is a watercolour whose soft light adds to its lightness while the noble dark figures of saints create the effect of quiet, mystic solemnity. The artist, said Kleczynski, moves through such a large scope so lightly, so effortlessly, that the only question that arises is where she will continue from there. Is it towards the fuller, realistically renaissance shapes without their strong plasticity, but with the lightness of a Parisian Polish, or towards landscapes and Polish churches or maybe towards some new syntheses?".
Her search for artistic inspiration just like her achievements are all reflected in both portraits, still lifes compositions and the scenes of interiors.
The analysis of a number of them shows how Chelmonska grades the plasticity of her form which eventually reaches its full dimension in, for instance, "In the Theatre Box". "Three women figures skillfully combined into a group by embracing movements, lighted by the lamplight, are soaked in the intensive colour where dominate the reds. The colour has such a great variety of shades with which the artist distinctly models the shape of the figures".
Thus it can be said that the pre-war painting reality of Chelmonska was fresh, rich and full of undiscovered possibilities. Her painting had a lot of national features both in form and content. The artist expressed a full range of feelings and emotions on her canvases. But the joy of life and the spontaneous reality she experienced made her an individualistic painter conveying images of clearly distinct nature. Michal Weinzieher mentioned the national character of Chelmonskas art. He said: "... being brought up from childhood on the traditions of French art she represents the gracefulness of French painting combined with her Slavic individuality manifested mainly in peculiar decorative elements".
It seems that the well-known Jan Kleczynski, (already in 1931), understood and classified Chelmonskas artistic creativity very well. Even though the text he published was not meant for a specialist and an art critic, it is worth quoting. He wrote then: "Certain characteristic features of Wanda Chelmonskas art, being typically Polish, found support in Paris, as somewhat related to it. What I mean (said Kleczynski) is this refined sense of humour, the subtle painting joke which perfectly combine with sensitivity, as it has been seen in the art and life of Poland- I mean the passion so present in Chopins letters and mazurkas, so warm there, but also in caricatures by Orlowski or Sokolowski and the whole range of young Polish painters with Tadeusz Pruszkowski at the head. There sounds the lyrical note in folk paintings by Stryjenska, Maslowski and Kedzierski but also in Jozef Chelmonskis works in the early stages of his career, before melancholy dropped in a heavy veil over his infinite passion with which he expressed his love for our nature.
The joke and the merriness in Chelmonska were rightly emphasized by the French critics as her national feature which they saw in the characters dressed in folk costumes she portrayed with all their decorations and the subtly marked power of movements". Humour and merriness were visible in the works of other Polish artists, too, particularly in women. "Stryjenska has that quality, other painters from "The Warsaw School" Teresa Roszkowska, Jadwiga Przeradzka, Maria Berezowska also have it, however, it is mostly a feature in Chelmonska. Her drawing ( especially in watercolours) consists of wavy lines, just like the line of a smiling female mouth chasing one another both in sea landscapes and in flowers or baroque country altars and city churches, combining into funny shapes they mock at the principles of perspective and gravity and dance around objects which function as a pretext for the painting. It is the lines that create life in the rows of bambers carrying feretories in processions in Poznan; they tremble on the dancers floating skirts in our bars and inns and carry the whole charm of Chelmonskas paintings".
The answer to the question posed in 1932 by J. Kleczynski: " how will Chelmonskas painting develop?" was brought, somewhat independently of the artists will, by the post-war course of political events. A different Poland, suppressed, closed and isolated gave the artist no chance, either in her private life, or in her artistic creativity. Her career, full of dynamism and prospects of further growth and development, was interrupted exactly half way.
After the war the themes of Chelmonskas paintings together with the used techniques underwent a change. Now she most often expressed herself in watercolour, in gouache or mixed techniques while thematically she focused her attention on still life, flowery compositions, portraits, landscapes and pieces of architecture. The flowery compositions, in particular, became a characteristic and quite popular theme of her works. Lilies, dahlias, ....., roses, lilacs, tulips and wild field flowers were becoming a constant element of her flat. She was more and more fascinated by details the architectonic ones as well as the elements of church and palace interiors.
However in the socialist Poland Wanda
Chelmonska did not manage to make a fresh start, to emerge on the surface, to accept
creating in unacceptable conditions. Although she worked and exhibited her works ( however
seldom did that happen) she never went back to her pre-war French and Polish periods of
active painting. Nonetheless her post-war landscapes and flowery compositions in
particular are marked by lyricism and romantic feeling built thanks to the subtle colour
effects. "When looking at her paintings, full of harmony in both composition and
colouring the viewer without any doubt can experience the feeling of piece, relaxation and
inner tranquility" Wanda Chelmonskas creativity, despite lacking the pre-war
energy and power, still was " a great art of expressing feelings".
To get more information, write us!