"Playwright, novelist, philosopher, critic, painter and photographer - all these descriptions do not give full justice to Witkacy’s versatile artistic activity." So ran an unusual resolution adopted by the Polish parliament this month, dedicated not to any political problem, but to an artist who died 70 years ago.
Over the last week, tributes to "Witkacy", the nickname of Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz, have been heard from many quarters. In the UK, a week-long festival dedicated to the genius has been held at the University of Westminster.
Witkacy, who seemed to be constantly tottering on the brink of a breakdown of sorts, took his own life on September 18th, 1939. After the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany on September 1st, he, like many Poles, both Catholic and Jewish, fled east. Yet the news that the Soviets had invaded from the east on September 17th, tipped him over the edge.
Witkacy lived for most of his life in Zakopane, and besides being a brilliant innovator in photography, painting, and drama, he was irresistibly attractive to the fairer sex. Several of his blazing portraits cam be seen at the Museum of the Zakopane Style.
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