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Tatra Beast-Catcher

Wojciech Brzega

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Basic information
ID
С-I-528
Author
Wojciech Brzega
Name
Tatra Beast-Catcher
Date of creation
early 1930s
Country
Poland
Culture
Contemporary times
Technique
carving
Material
lime wood
Dimensions (height x width x depth, cm)
50 x 40 x 30
Additionally
Type
sculpture
Genre
genre art
Provenance
Collection of Lviv Museum of Art and Crafts
Information about author
Author
Wojciech Brzega
Artist's lifetime
1872–1941
Country
Austro-Hungarian Empire, Poland
Biography
Wojciech Brzega (1872–1941) was a Polish sculptor, furniture maker, promoter of the Zakopane style, writer, teacher, and public figure. He was born into a locksmith's family in Zakopane. His father died shortly after his birth. The artist was brought up by his mother and later took her surname. Between 1885 and 1889, after graduating from the folk school, W. Brzega studied in the decorative sculpture class at the Woodworking School in Zakopane. After 1889, he worked as a master carver in Cieszyn and Bielsko-Biala workshops and sculpture workshops in Krakow and Lviv. From 1895 to 1898, he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow under Alfred Daun. In 1898, he studied in Munich under Heinrich Knirr. From 1899 to 1901, he continued his studies in Paris at the National School of Fine Arts. From 1901, he worked in Zakopane. He married Stefania Czartoryska in 1912. He opened a studio in his apartment, where he organised exhibitions of decorative and applied arts by artists from the "Sztuka Podhalańska" Association. He devoted himself to decorative sculpture, furniture, and decorative and applied arts. From 1903, he created decorative and applied objects and furniture in the Zakopane style. He worked mainly in wood. In his portraits, he used bronze, terracotta, and plaster. He made his debut at the Zakopane Art Exhibition in 1902. Between 1909 and 1939, he participated in almost all the exhibitions organised by the Zakopane Art Society. He is the author of memoirs, plays, ethnographic and historical articles. His works were published in the regional magazines "Zakopane", "Góral", and "Młody Taternik". In 1913, the artist published the book "Possessions. Stories from the Podhale". Based on his memoirs donated to the Tatra Museum, he wrote the book "Life of an Honest Verkhovyna Resident" in 1969. Between 1922 and 1937, he taught sculpture at the Woodworking School in Zakopane. In 1926–1929, he was its director. The achievements of W. Brzega's public activity include co-founding the Verkhovyna Residents' Association (1904), co-founding the Podhale Art Society (1909), organising the first Podhale Residents' Congress in Zakopane (1911), membership in the Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts (1925–1939), co-founding the "Modła" Union, and membership in the National League.
Object description
The "Tatra Beast-Catcher" work (early 1930s) reflects the cultural and ideological priorities and research interests of the author, who identified himself as a representative of the authentic culture of the region, was one of the promoters of the Zakopane style, studied the life and customs of the Verkhovyna people, and reflected the results of his research in many historical and ethnographic articles. A graduate and later teacher and director of the woodworking school in Zakopane, the master worked mainly in wood, creating a series of portraits and genre sculptures in this traditional material with "deep semantic resonance in the collective consciousness" (Z. Chehusova). Based on a thorough knowledge of peasant " labour and days ", they are characterised by narrative, illustrative, authentic and detailed reproduction of labour actions and tools, typical anthropological features. The master paid great attention to folk costumes, lovingly and carefully depicting scrolls, shirts, and broad-brimmed hats. The works in wood are characterised by decorativeness, excessive detail and descriptiveness, and a certain excess of artistic convention, designed to give the image an aesthetic generality and distance art from life. The peculiarity of the "Tatra Beast-Catcher" is the modelling of the form with geometric surfaces, which makes the figure resemble mountain ranges and visualises the unity of man and nature.
Inscriptions
On a stand on the back: "2017".
Legal regulation
Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery

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