Stanisław Kamocki (1875 Warsaw - 1944 Zakopane), View of the river

Provenance
collection of the heirs of painter Stanislaw Pochwalski (1896 - 1959)

Biography
In 1891 he graduated from the School of Fine Arts in Cracow, studying there under Florian Cynk, Józef Unierzyski, Leon Wyczółkowski, Jacek Malczewski and Jan Stanislawski. Thanks to a scholarship, he continued his studies in Paris. He also visited Italy, Germany and Switzerland. In 1919 he took over the chair of landscape at the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow. As a teacher, he continued the program of his master Jan Stanislawski, organizing plein-air landscape paintings. It was from Stanislawski that he took over his love of nature, sensitivity of observation and affectionate attitude to the landscape of the Polish countryside. Hence, frequent motifs appearing in his paintings are: cornfields, potato fields, haystacks, trees, manor houses, country churches viewed at different times of the year. Kamocki searched for these themes while wandering through the villages of Podolia, Volhynia, Spisz, and especially the lands of Podkraka and Podhale. He painted his pictures in the open air. In the first period of his work (1900-1915) he painted with thick oil paste, which he applied generously, achieving the effect of a concrete material painting surface. In doing so, he operated with a not very wide range of colors. In summer landscapes he used heavy greens with not too strong valor tension. He generally used local colors and remained true to the subject. In his later period, paint was laid down in cursory, broad brush strokes, giving his paintings a matte surface. He was a member of such art groups as "Art", the Vienna Secession, the Union of Polish Artists and the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts.