Date: 1983
Size: 27 x 38 inches
Artist: Wiktor Sadowski
About the Artist: Wiktor Sadowski is a Polish artist working in poster, illustration and painting. He was born in Oleandry, Poland in 1956. He graduated in 1981 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in Tomaszewski's studio.
About the Poster: Beginning in the 1950s and through the 1980s, the Polish School of Posters combined the aesthetics of painting with the succinctness and simple metaphor of the poster. It developed characteristics such as painterly gesture, linear quality, and vibrant colors, as well as a sense of individual personality, humor, and fantasy. It was in this way that the polish poster was able to make the distinction between designer and artist less apparent.
Polish posters have come to stand apart from the advertising design conventions fostered in Europe during the 20th century. It was during the communist regime, a time when culture was closely monitored by the state, that Polish artists found liberation in poster art. Ironically, this foremost public art form became ground for individual expression. During that period, the cultural institutions, of theatre and cinema especially, flourished as they were funded by government agencies. Artists freshly out of the fine arts academy flocked towards poster production as the demand for this art was rapidly growing. The result became some of the most unique and expressive posters the world has ever seen - and artworks in themselves.
About the Opera: The Haunted Manor is an opera in four acts composed by Polish composer Stanislaw Moniuszko in 1861–1864. The libretto was written by Jan Checinski. Despite being a romance and a comedy, it has strong Polish patriotic undertones, which made it both popular with the Polish public and unpopular – to the point of being banned – by the Russian authorities of Congress Poland.
The poster is slightly ruffled, ready to frame.