Portrait of man

Stanisław Lentz received his artistic education at the School of Fine Arts in Kraków under the guidance of Feliks Szynalewski and Izydor Jabłoński (in 1877-1879), and later at the Drawing Class under Wojciech Gerson in Warsaw. He improved his skills abroad, at the Academy in Munich, in the studio of Alexander Wagner and Gyula Benczur (1880-1884), and then in Paris, at the Académie Julian (1884-1887). In 1909, he became a professor of painting at the Warsaw School of Fine Arts and, at the same time, the director of this school. Lentz became famous above all for his numerous realistic portraits. He skilfully portrayed various emotional states and personalities, and he also focused much attention on presenting details of women's clothes. Men were portrayed more modestly, but usually, he enriched their images with attributes attesting to a high social status. Most often, he portrayed the bourgeois elite. In the collection of the National Museum in Szczecin, there is Portret mężczyzny [Portrait of a Man] from around 1917. He is massively built, aged about 60. He occupies the right side of the painting, is portrayed from the knees, sitting facing the left. His posture is both casual and rather formal - he is supporting the backrest of the sofa with his right hand, while with his left, he is holding a notebook with a green cover lying on his lap (on the left, on the sofa, there are more notebooks). The representation is not idealised since the face is elongated, with a large double chin peeking out from above the halter and a large grey moustache. The man is almost bald, with grey strands of hair at the sides. The costume, sofa, curtain and background are painted in dark tones. The realistically painted serious face with noble features, showing the man's great experience, contrasts sharply with the dark background. The way of portraying refers us to portraits typical of the Munich school.

Beata Małgorzata Wolska