Objects

The notebook, covered in grey paper, we learn reveals to us what Felicja Blumental, a fourth-grade student, was learning during botany lessons at the Girls’ Gymnasium run by Cecylia Goldman-Landau (it was in the school year 1921/1922). Her natural science and geography teacher was then, most likely, Zofia Helena Smiśniewicz (b. 1896) (see https://sztetl.org.pl/en/towns/w/18-warsaw/102-education-and-culture/138812-gimnazjum-i-liceum-cecylii-goldman-landauowej-w-warszawie). | The 30-sheet unruled notebook contains tissue paper dividers, dried flowers and drawings; the latter are of most interest for us. In each dated and numbered lesson, we find precise and artful images of organisms: from bacteria (captioned: “Various shapes of bacteria under a very high magnification”), through fungi, lichens, ferns, mosses, field horsetail, marsh marigold (also as a dried specimen) and anemone flowers... | Renata Piątkowska