Olga Boznańska. Kraków – Munich – Paris

Starting in 1860 Japanese coloured woodcuts began to arrive in French ports along with china and tea, from where they reached merchants dealing in Asian goods and antiquities in Paris. They triggered off a fashion for Japan that lasted for decades. One of the first European painters to discover coloured woodcuts in 1862 in the port of Le Havre, was the American, James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834–1903), who lived in Paris and London, and who, in the following years painted several portraits of women in Japanese costumes or with corresponding utensils.[12] One of these was a portrait of a young woman standing by the fireside in a sweet smelling white dress and holding a Japanese fan: “Symphony in White, No. 2: Little White Girl” (1864, Tate Britain, London). Very early on, contemporaries recognised a close connection between Boznańska’s paintings and those of Whistler.[13] In 1888 a large selection of his paintings was shown at the III International Exhibition of Art in Munich, where Boznańska was also present with a “Study”.[14] That said, Whistler’s “Little White Girl” was first shown there in 1892, once more alongside paintings by Boznańska.[15] In today’s eyes her “Young Woman with a Red Parasol” seems modern and, if we did not know of the circumstances, we might date it as around 1900, primarily because of her summary treatment of the white dress, which is far removed from Whistler’s finely detailed paintings. But we can also recognise another influence: Boznańska’s somewhat coarse portrait of a “Young Woman” in a characteristic black hat is reminiscent of the well-known pictures of women made by the Munich painter, Wilhelm Leibl (1844-1900), the sole artist whom Boznańska was later to acknowledge as an important role model.[16] Here we can think of Leibl’s “Head of a Peasant Girl“ (1879, Gemäldegalerie Neue Meister, Dresden), his famous “Three Women in Church“ (1882, Hamburg Kunsthalle) or his ”Girl with a Carnation” (1880/81, Belvedere, Vienna).

The following pictures from her years in Munich proved that Boznańska was grappling with a variety of contemporary and historical directions in art, although this was not always entirely clear. The portrait of a young woman with bare shoulders, also known as the “Gypsy Woman” (1888, Ill. 4), presumably a studio model, is reminiscent of Edouard Manet’s enticing “Bohémien” (1861/62, Louvre Abu Dhabi) with a scarf tied around his head, which originally belonged to a picture of a pair of gypsies, entitled “Les Gitans”. Presumably Boznańska painted her picture during her summer holidays in Kraków, where it was shown in the following year in an exhibition staged by the TPSP, and which later arrived in the National Museum in the city as a gift from the daughter of the architect and deputy mayor of Kraków, Józef Sare (1850-1929).

[12] Klaus Berger: Japonismus in der westlichen Malerei 1860-1920, Munich 1980, page 19, 36-53 etc.

[13] Ewa Bobrowska: Olga Boznańska and Her Artistic Friendships, in: Exhibition cat.. Olga Boznańska, Kraków 2014, page 74

[14] Illustrated catalogue of the III international Art Exhibition (Munich Jubilee Exhibition) in the Königl. Glaspalaste in Munich 1888, Munich 1888, Whistler no. 2452-2465, Boznańska no. 704; online: http://daten.digitale-sammlungen.de/~db/0000/bsb00002401/images/index.html?seite=00001&l=de 

[15] Illustrated catalogue of the VI International Art Exhibition 1892 in the Kgl. Glaspalaste, 1. June - end October, Munich 1892, Whistler no. 1950-1950b, Boznańska no. 244-245; online: http://daten.digitale-sammlungen.de/~db/0000/bsb00002406/images/index.html?seite=00001&l=de 

[16] Piotr Kopszak: In Munich, in: Exhibition cat.. Olga Boznańska, Kraków 2014, page 44