Landscape

Adam Wiktor Malinowski (1829-1892) painted customary scenes and landscapes using an academic formula of studies according to the old masters. His landscape scenes shown in warm diffused light are careful compositions based on a thorough study of natural forms and details; while monumentalising the landscape, he showed small genre scenes.

Pejzaż [Landscape] shows an overgrown bough of a tree, stretched over a stream, forming the dominant feature of the composition. It gives an opportunity to present details reproduced with precision and painterly insight. Distant parts of the landscape are characterised by generalised shapes, silhouettes of bushes and trees. The composition is enlivened by two female figures approaching the current of the river. The main theme, however, is the creation of the landscape space by means of varied dusk light – it shows a clear glow against the background of the sky, brings out the details of the branches, softly captures the landscape in the further stretches of the painting. The light expresses the symbolic meaning of the painting, related to divine epiphany, but it also becomes a way of realistic, careful observation of nature.

Malinowski, following academic tradition, at the same time becomes an attentive interpreter of realistic trends in 19th century painting.

Marcin Lachowski