Jerzy Potocki

Jerzy Potocki (1889-1961) was the son of Roman and Elżbieta Radziwiłł, the owners of the Łańcut Castle, and brother of Alfred Potocki, the last Entailer of Łańcut. He studied law at Lviv University and Oxford University and agriculture in Halle. During the First World War, he served in the Austrian army and independent Poland in the Polish Army in the 3rd Lancers Regiment in the rank of captain. In the years 1919-1920, he was adjutant to Józef Piłsudski. In 1930, he became a senator of the Republic of Poland. He administered the Pomorzany estate inherited from his father in the Zborowski district. He travelled to Africa and India, among other places, and published Wspomnienia myśliwskie z Indiach [Memoirs of a Hunter from India] (Lwów 1927), Na wojny i na łowach [At War and Hunting Grounds] (Warsaw 1932). In 1933-1936, he was the ambassador of the Republic of Poland in Ankara and later in Washington until 1940. He then settled in Lima, married the Peruvian Susana Rosa Yturregui y Orbegoso. The bronze bust of Jerzy Potocki was made in 1935 in Ankara by Roman Biliński (1897-1981), a sculptor and painter little-known in Poland. He studied in Lviv, Kraków and Kiyv. He lived in Istanbul, where he taught painting at the American Roberts College. In 1945, he settled in Bordighera (Italy). The bust depicts Potocki with his hair combed back, wearing a shirt, tie, waistcoat and jacket. The texture of the sculpture is characteristic: crushed and refracting light. Barbara Trojnar