Władysław Ślewiński
1854 - 1918

Władysław Ślewiński took up agricultural studies in 1875 with the intent of eventually taking over his father's estate, Pilaszkowice. In 1888, however, after two years of failures in farming, he left for Paris. In the French capital he shared his apartment with Zygmunt Andrychiewicz, a painter whom he regarded as his first teacher. He studied briefly at Académie Julian and then, for two years, at Académie Colarossi. There he met Paul Gauguin with whom he established a close and lasting friendship. In Gauguin's company, he frequented the café "Chez Madame Charlotte," where he met, among others, August Strindberg (whom he represented on canvas), Zenon Przesmycki, Alfons Mucha, Stanisław Wyspiański, Józef Mehoffer, and Karol Maszkowski. Also at Café Volpini, Ślewiński became acquainted with the principles of synthetism, a painting method cultivated by Gauguin and his friends. He went to Brittany with Gauguin for the first time in 1889; and later took up residence there at Bas Pouldu, where he frequently hosted Gauguin (who painted Ślewiński's portrait) and other friends from the Pont-Aven group.

He also maintained close contacts with the Russian artistic milieu in Paris as well as with Stanisław Przybyszewski and Edvard Munch, among others. In 1898, with his future wife the Russian painter Evgenija Shevtsova, he traveled to Spain. Then in 1905, he returned to Poland, first to Warsaw, where he organized a one-man show of his work and then to Kraków. His studio there was visited by Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz (Witkacy) and Tymon Niesiołowski. Finally in 1906, Ślewiński moved to Zakopane and then to the village of Poronin in the Tatra Mountains, where he met Stanisław Witkiewicz (Witkacy's father), Jan Stanisławski, Leopold Staff, and Jan Kasprowicz. At the end of 1907, he went to Munich where he stayed for several months, joining the Kunstverein (Art Association). In 1908 he received a professorship at the Warsaw School of Fine Arts, a position he soon renounced, and instead, set up a school in his studio on Polna Street.

In 1910, however, he had decided to leave Poland for good. He settled in Doëlan, a small Breton port on the Atlantic. He was often visited there by younger artists coming from Poland or Paris, among them, Witkacy and Tadeusz Makowski. Although he returned to Poland only for short visits, he maintained close contacts with his country until the outbreak of World War I, often sending his paintings to exhibitions at the Society of Friends of the Fine Arts (TPSP) in Lvov and Kraków. He participated in several exhibitions of the Society of Polish Artists, “Sztuka”, having been invited through the mediation of Wyspiański, Mehoffer, and Maszkowski, to join that group in 1897, the year of its founding.

Ślewiński's philosophy of art seems to stem from an excerpted statement of his about Gauguin: "He is so much an artist that he has to be wholly accepted or else rejected. I can feel him and accept him totally, for he suits my ideas of art and beauty" (see Ślewiński 1904). Having adopted the principles of synthetism, the Polish artist left his own imprint on them. Beginning with his early works, he simplified forms and painted in flat areas, within which, however, he did not give up chiaroscuro and modeling. He encircled areas with contours, though he sometimes blended color into color. While he sometimes verged on abstraction (particularly in certain seascapes), his lighting never departed completely from direct observation of nature. His approach to so-called subjective color was similar, as can be seen in some of the landscapes from the Tatra Mountains.

Perhaps more important for Ślewiński than the selective application of synthetism was his search – inspired by Gauguin – for simplicity and sincerity in places untouched by modern civilization as well as in objects of daily use. This desire was probably the decisive factor that led him to choose the remote quietude of Brittany for his abode, or Podhale and Kazimierz on the Vistula as working places. In landscapes, portraits, and still lifes he omitted the details

of representation in favor of revealing the essence. His subjects included, in equal measure, elements of water and snow, his own face, likenesses of people from his surroundings, the physiognomies of Polish highlanders or Breton peasants, and bouquets in plain, clay vases. Since he eschewed narration and allegory, he was said to practice pure painting, or "art for art's sake". In his art, Ślewiński concentrated on the object, infusing its materiality with the reflective sensitivity of a painter. The form and color determined the painting's atmosphere. The artist used mainly earth colors, sometimes enlivened with stronger accents. He employed a repertoire of forms with curving contours, and painted without a drawn sketch, as was characteristic of the epoch.

He organized one-man shows in Warsaw (1905, 1909); Kraków (1906), and Lvov (1907), and also took part in exhibitions in Lvov (1897, 1911-1913); Warsaw (1897, 1910-1912); Kraków (1913, 1914, 1916); and Vienna (1909. His debut in Paris took place at the Salon des Indépendents in 1895 and was followed by one-man shows there in 1897, 1898, and 1914.

-- Artur Tanikowski

Works in the collection: