Portrait study (Ludmiła Rozwadowska II)

Information

Inventory no

MNS/143/S

Department

Dział Sztuki

Technique

olej/płótno

Copyright classification

Description

Bolesław Barbacki painted Ludmiła Rozwadowska twice. Both canvases were created in 1925, and the presented painting is the second version of her portrait. It shows the model in a rather sensual shot, sitting on a red sofa with a strongly exposed cleavage and a naked left arm. The Barbacki family donated this portrait to the museum collection in 1948.

However, thanks to archival research, we know that the painting came to the Museum before the outbreak of World War II. This is evidenced by, among others,  a handwritten annotation by Bolesław Barbacki, in a notebook kept since 1936 with a list of his works, which he added in a red pen the Museum of the Sądecka Land in the section identifying the owner of the portrait. This fact is also confirmed by found archival photographs of the exhibits, taken by curator Roman Szkaradek in 1938. One of them shows a portrait of Rozwadowska, presented at an exhibition in the castle at that time. In the museum inventory written by Szkaradek after the war, in the entry describing this photo, there is information that it was taken in the Museum of the Sądecka Region and that the painting was preserved by the author. This would mean that after the outbreak of the war, the artist took this canvas to his home, where it safely waited until the end of hostilities, and then it was returned to the Museum. 

 
Edyta Ross-Pazdyk