Study of a Face

Probably a prototype of a vase. „The biography of Cybis, a founding member of the „Brotherhood of St Luke”, is, by Polish standards, rather unusual and not obvious. He took his first artistic steps in 1917 in Kharkiv, in the Cubo-Futurist „Union of Seven” as a sculptor. Fleeing the grip of the revolution, he landed in Constantinople. He painted signs and theatre decorations, and mainly went hungry. His diary, published in fragments in the exhibition catalogue, is about this. Having arrived in Warsaw, Cybis became a student of Tadeusz Pruszkowski, an outstanding teacher but a very conservative artist. He rather quickly gained recognition and a position in this artistic circle, being perhaps the most interesting painter in the entire Brotherhood. He travelled to Italy, but also to North Africa; this second expedition would have important artistic consequences. In the spring of 1939 he left for America for the World's Fair in New York. He never returned to Poland, nor to painting. In America he founded a studio of artistic ceramics whose products gained great popularity in the States and made Cybis a very wealthy man. He died of a heart attack in Florida in 1957 and was buried in Princeton.” (Bogusław Deptuła, Tygodnik Powszechny, no. 43 (2781), 27 October 2002)