The first sprouts

Kazimierz Sichulski (1879-1942) was another artist, following Teodor Axentowicz, who searched for painting themes in the folklore of the Hutsul highlanders. For an artist who had grown up in the school of Wyspiański, the vivid colours and decorative quality of the Hutzul heritage was an inspiration. For long months, he ensconced himself in remote, wild areas of the Carpathian Mountains, studying the lives of the Hutzuls and creating an inimitable gallery of Hutzul figures and exotic genre scenes. In Sichulski’s work, there is a visible tendency towards a decorative, Art Nouveau stylisation of form.