Park in Orońsko

Józef Brandt was one of the few Polish artists to achieve fame during his lifetime. His art enjoyed great success also outside the country. From 1870 he lived permanently in Munich where he led the Polish artistic colony. The Munich workshop was an informal painting workshop where young adepts of painting found support, often financially. Brandt spent his holidays in Orońsko. Situated near Radom, the estate with a palace and extensive park was brought as a dowry by his wife, Helena Pruszakowa, née Woyciechowska. During his stays, he was occupied with managing the estate, but he did not neglect art. He organised courses for beginning artists, jokingly called by them the Free Academy of Orońsko. The master himself took a rest from painting battle scenes, rallies, marches, Cossacks, and Tartars that were typical for his works. The estate and its surroundings provided beautiful views. Often, directly in the open air, the painter recorded the events and landscapes he observed on small formats: the park, country homesteads, inns, and meadows.

Park w Orońsku [Park in Orońsko] from 1890 shows a fragment of nature, a glade with several slender trees with patches of light blue shining through, illuminated on one side by the sun. Olive greens and golden browns dominate the colours – it is a park seen at the end of summer. The painting is an example of the lesser-known, more personal work of the great battle artist. Although landscape in its various forms constantly functioned in his compositions as a background for genre scenes, it is an independent theme. Also, the way of representation makes it quite exceptional in Brandt's legacy. This insightful and at the same time accessible, unforced study of the short mystery of nature delights with its sense of observation, sensitivity to ‘common’ beauty, and technical freedom.

The Brandt estate was destroyed during the First World War. The displaced family settled in Radom. A few months later, in 1915, Józef Brandt died of pneumonia. The Centre of Polish Sculpture has operated in Orońsko since 1969.

Bożena Kasperowicz