Karol Szymanowski October 26, 1936 in front of Villa Atma in Zakopane (1936/1940) by Antoni Marian WieczorekThe National Museum in Krakow
Karol Szymanowski (1882-1937)
For Karol Szymanowski the starting point of the journey on which, due to the ravages of history, he was forced to embark was the manor house in Tymoszówka in the Czehryń district of the Kiev Governorate (currently in Ukraine).
Tymoshivka in Ukraine, in the eastern reaches of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, was a place where the cultural paths of the East and West crossed, home to Poles, Rusyns, Tatars, and Cossacks.
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Villa Atma
The villa 'Atma' in Zakopane houses the world's only biographical museum of Karol Szymanowski.
Landscape in the hall (1940) by Antoni Marian WieczorekThe National Museum in Krakow
The symbolic end point was Zakopane, where the composer, as he stated himself, found a place to call home.
Autograph of the first draft of the score of "Harnasie" by Karol Szymanowski, offered by the composer to Irena Warden by Karol SzymanowskiThe National Museum in Krakow
Let it be "national", yet not "provincial"
Szymanowski was a composer and a humanist, a creator with commitment; he lived and worked in the times of the significant transformations taking place in art at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Karol Szymanowski (1931) by Stanisław Ignacy WitkiewiczThe National Museum in Krakow
Through these he remained himself; a powerful personality, an aesthete, a sensitive writer of lyric poetry, a composer of sensuous works, a poet of sound.
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“Atma”, the spirit of the Highlands
Atma is the beloved Highlander cottage in which Szymanowski lived in the years 1930-1935.
Dance (1921) by Władysław SkoczylasThe National Museum in Krakow
Aim: to take Polish musical culture to the wider world
Clouds – Zakopane (1904) by Jan StanisławskiThe National Museum in Krakow
The creator of Stabat Mater and Harnasie wished to catch up with Europe, to free Polish music from its place on the periphery of Europe.
Chopin Frederik Francois 1810-1849.LIFE Photo Collection
For Szymanowski, the highest authority figure in music was Frédéric Chopin, whom he called the greatest revolutionary in the history of music, a futurist even.
Szymanowski’s vision was a vision of Poland in Europe and in the world in general, of a place open to encounter and dialogue between different cultures, as well as to the exotica of the Orient. He demanded of Polish music: Let it be ‘national’, yet not ‘provincial (1920).
Giewont (1921) by Władysław SkoczylasThe National Museum in Krakow
To the sources: the Highlands
In the Podhale region, Szymanowski found the eternally beating heart of a national music.
He appealed to other artists with these words: It is my wish that the young generation of Polish musicians understand what riches, ones which may reanimate our anaemic music, are hidden in this Polish ‘barbarism’ which I have ‘discovered’ and understood for myself (1924).
In saying this, however, he was not speaking of superficial ‘clippings’ of folk motifs or a tawdry musical pastiche, the bane of the music of those times, but rather of a deeply spiritual inspiration which would be much more than a mere ‘citation’ from folk music.
The head of an old Highlander (1911) by Władysław SkoczylasThe National Museum in Krakow
He often repeated that when an artist creates with true sincerity, the ethnic person ends and the universal person begins, even when the language used is a national one.
At ‘Atma’ which currently houses his biographical museum, a branch of the National Museum in Krakow, works were created such as the ballet-pantomime Harnasie, Symphony No. 4 (Symphonie concertante), the Violin Concerto No. 2, in spirit a Highlander piece, and the Litany to the Virgin Mary.
Zakopane in Winter (1906) by Jan StanisławskiThe National Museum in Krakow
It was here where Szymanowski was introduced by Bartuś Obrochota into the world of the music of Podhale - primaeval, suggestive, ‘prehistoric’. In 1936, Szymanowski wrote: Zakopane is the only place in Poland where I am still able to morally persevere.
On one of the pages of the sketches for Harnasie, he noted with a flamboyant gesture: Movement!! Rhythm! And it was with just this kind of energy that he combined the spirit of the Highlands. He left an important mark.
Text: Małgorzata Janicka-Słysz, selection: Agata Jabłońska
