[Jan Matejko, 19th century European painter]

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Jan Matejko: The Painter and Patriot

Introduction

Almost every individual in Poland is, in a sense, conveyed up on Matejko's large chronicled paintings. Disseminated in thousands of reproductions, they have, for generations, assisted the juvenile and some not so juvenile visualize salient happenings in the annals of the nation. To realise the genesis of such chronicled decorating it should be recalled that at the time in the 19th century when Matejko conceived these canvases, the Polish countries were partitioned between Russia, Prussia, which morphed into Germany, and Austria. In the countries used by Russia and Germany, strenuous efforts were made by the occupying forces to mark out Polishness. (Batorska, 57) The use of the Polish dialect was forbidden in schools. Also to hinder transmission of information about the country's pleased annals, censorship lived that competently ostracised publication of textbooks and the like that administered with the subject. In these attenuating components, chronicled paintings which could be utilised as a way of conveying such information presumed a significance and relevance else seldom accorded to them. Matejko, a fervent Polish patriot, dedicated much of his gifts to this cause. (Szypowska, 18)

Jan Matejko, 19th Century European painter 

Jan Matejko was born on June 24, 1838, in Kraków, the ninth progeny of Franciszek and Joanna. Franciszek Matejko, his dad, was of Czech origin. Born in Kárlové Hradec, he had arrived to Poland as a tutor in the family of Polish gentry, the Wodzickis. Later on he resolved in Kraków where he educated melodies and administered place of adoration choirs. In 1826, Franciszek wed Joanna Karolina Rozberg, a female child of Jan Piotr Rossberg who was from Saxony, to-day a part of Germany. Joanna, whose mother was Polish, kept her father's Lutheran faith. Thus only one quarter of the ancestry of Jan Matejko, the large polish patriotic decorator, was Polish. However, in the Matejko dwelling on Florianska Street in Kraków there prevailed a Polish patriotic atmosphere. Portraits of Poland's champions - Kosciuszko, Poniatowski - dangled on the walls. Polish publications abounded. (Szypowska, 18)

At a very early age, Jan Matejko was presented to Spiewy Historyczne (Historical Songs) by Niemcewicz, a set of straightforward patriotic recital verses explaining episodes in Polish history. History was a subject that really enthralled him. As a progeny, playing with his male siblings and sister (he had eight male siblings and two sisters) he admired to stage chronicled tableaus. Invariably, these scenes would comprise the number of a Polish King.

Jan's second passion, furthermore disclosed at a very early age, was drawing. He started to draw before he wise to read and compose and illustrated and wholeheartedly outstanding gifts for it. Already as a progeny, (Szypowska, 18) he made a replicate the illustrations in Niemcewicz's Spiewy Historyczne, drew many sketches of Kosciuszko and Poniatowski, portraits of other chronicled numbers, costumes, palaces, and so on. It appeared that from the very starting he discovered drawing and annals to be inseparable. Certainly, his natural tendencies were formed and reinforced by the air of ...