Katarzyna Chrzanowska // Guild of painters in Cracow in the 18th century. The activities of the guild and its members in relation to the social and artistic phenomena of the period
The main aim of my dissertation is to reconstruct the way in which the painters’ and gilders’ guild functioned in eighteenth-century Cracow as an organisation, with particular reference to the issue of apprentice training and the regulation of opportunities for taking on new commissions, and the place of this professional group among the craftsmen’s guilds operating in the city at the time. The relationship between the guild members and the painters operating in Cracow outside this structure will also be analysed, in particular the court painters of the bishops of Cracow, and artists of unclear status. The research attempts to reconstruct the network of professional and personal relationships between painters, their contacts with their commissioners and their material status.
The examination of documents relating to the guild’s activities makes it possible to distinguish which members of the organisation were painters, varnishers or gilders, which provides a basis for indicating the types of work they may have done and possibly further linking them to specific realisations. Combining analysis of surviving artworks and archival records in other sources, the dissertation will attempt to identify the work of individual painters.
The research also brings information about unknown signed works by Cracow painters made in the 18th century, which make it possible to expand our knowledge of their œuvre and individual mannerisms. The photographic documentation collected also forms the basis for the identification and analysis of the prints used by painters active in Cracow as graphic patterns.
[Caption: Łukasz Orłowski: Saint Stanislaus before the King, 1753, National Museum in Cracow, Inv. No. MNK I-239 © CC0 – Public Domain]