Dauber Lajzer – return from an auction

The engraving Tandeciarz Lajzer, czyli powrót z licytacji [The Cheapjack Lajzer, or Return from Auction], comes from the album Kram malowniczy warszawski, czyli obrazy miejscowe z ubiegłych czasów [A Picturesque Warsaw Stall, i.e. Local Paintings from Past Times], published in Warsaw in 1855-1859. The album comprises twenty-four panels divided into four parts (covers). The first part, devoted to "types and characteristics of Old Jewish people in Warsaw", contains six engravings depicting Jews engaged in small trade. The title Tandeciarz Lajzer is portrayed as a bearded, elderly man trading in old goods. The rich assortment of objects presented in his hands and tucked behind the lapel of his coat includes, among others, curtains rolled up on a spool, razors, cigars, pliers, scissors, candlesticks.

The creator of the album was Jan Feliks Piwarski, born in the Lublin region, in Włostowice near Puławy, a professor at the Warsaw School of Fine Arts, where he promoted interest in folk types and Polish landscapes. Thanks to Piwarski, plein-air studies were introduced and his students were the first to be able to make sketches outside the walls of the studio. These "artistic excursions" were described by "Tygodnik Ilustrowany" as follows (No. 13, 1859) as follows: "Surrounded by a group of a dozen or so, or sometimes several dozen, disciples, the esteemed teacher would lead them to the most appropriate places for studying nature, he would choose the points and seat everyone according to their needs; then going round one by one, he would look at the drawings, point out the mistakes, encourage, advise, correct, and finally, taking the sketch book himself, he would sit down somewhere on the sidelines, working together with the young people". Among Piwarski's disciples were eminent artists such as: Wojciech Gerson, Franciszek Kostrzewski, Henryk Pillati, Józef Simmler and Józef Szermentowski.

Piwarski became known above all as a draughtsman and graphic artist. He studied the secrets of the graphic art in Vienna, while working in the Imperial Engraving Cabinet, and after his return to Warsaw as a curator of the Engraving Cabinet of the University of Warsaw. His interest in graphics resulted in spreading a new technique - galvanography, which he worked on together with Seweryn Oleszczyński. The artist's great achievement was Album cynkograficzno-rysunkowe warszawskie w dwunastu obrazach [The Album of Warsaw Tinctures and Drawings in Twelve Pictures] (1841), which is a record of the city's history.

Anna Hałata