Ajdukiewicz, Tadeusz
Ajdukiewicz, Tadeusz (Thaddäus von Ajdukiewicz), Polish painter, member of the “Munich School”. 1873-75: student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich/Akademie der Bildenden Künste München. *1852 Wieliczka, †9.1. (10.1., 19.1.?) 1916 in Kraków. Cousin of the painter Zygmunt Ajdukiewicz. 1868-73: studies at the School of Drawing and Painting/Szkoła Rysunku i Malarstwa in Kraków under Władysław Łuszczkiewicz (1828-1900), and then at the Art Academy in Vienna. On the 30.10.1873 he enrols in the antiquity class at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts/Königlichen Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Munich; studies under Otto Seitz (1846-1912) and Sandór (Alexander von) Wagner (1838-1919), also in the workshop of Józef Brandt (1841-1915). 1875: he returns to Poland, where he works as a farmer and horse breeder. In Kraków he paints pictures from Polish history (“Scene from the January Uprising”, 1875, private collection), in the Ukraine he completes portraits of aristocratic Polish families. 1877: travels to Paris, Egypt, Asia Minor. Subsequently in Kraków he paints portraits of actresses, as well as oriental and Polish genre scenes. Around 1883 he decides to live in Vienna where he paints hunting and military scenes, uniform and equestrian portraits for the Kaiser’s family and the Ministry of War. 1891: he is made a member of the Vienna Artists’ House. 1893: he is commissioned to make a portrait of the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) in London, following which he is commissioned to paint portraits in Sofia. 1894: Sultan Abdul Hamid II commissions him to paint in Constantinople. 1896: in Sofia, then in Bucharest. 1899: works in the court of the Czar in St. Petersburg. Around 1904: court painter in Bucharest. During the First World War he serves in Polish Legions; he dies in the military hospital in Cracow. His works can be found in the National Museums in Warsaw, Kraków and Poznań, in the Museum at Rzeszów, in the Art Museum in Łódź/Muzeum Sztuki w Łodzi, in the Military History Museum in Vienna and in the Rudolfinum in Prague.
Group exhibitions: 1874-1901 Cracow, Warsaw, Lemberg/Lwów: Society of the Friends of the Fine Arts / 1888 Vienna, International Jubilee Art Exhibition / 1916 Cracow, Palace of Art/Pałac Sztuki / 1921 Warsaw, House of Art / 1927 Lemberg/Lwów, House of Art.
Further Reading: Österreichisches Biographisches Lexikon 1815-1950, vol. 1 (Lieferung 1, 1954), p. 11; Saur Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon, vol. 1, Munich/Leipzig 1992, p. 686; Halina Stępień/Maria Liczbińska: Artyści polscy w środowisku monachijskim w latach 1828-1914. Materiały źródłowe, Warsaw 1994, p. 11 (= Zdzisław), 27; Halina Ste̜pień: Artyści polscy w środowisku monachijskim w latach 1856-1914 (Studia z historii sztuki / Instytut Sztuki, Polska Akademia Nauk, 50), Warsaw 2003; Egzotyczna Europa. Kraj urodzenia na płótnach polskich monachijczyków/Das exotische Europa. Heimatvisionen auf den Gemälden der polnischen Künstler in München, exhibition catalogue. Suwałki 2015
Online: Matriculation data base, Matriculation book 3, Academy of Fine Arts Munich, 02904 Tadeus Aidukiewiez (sic!), http://matrikel.adbk.de/matrikel/mb_1841-1884/jahr_1873/matrikel-02904
Many works at the Pinakoteka Zascianek, https://www.pinakoteka.zascianek.pl/Ajdukiewicz/Index.htm
Axel Feuß, March 2017
