Objects

One of a group of contour drawings made on a thin sheet of paper (now cream-coloured); the sheet was originally folded so that the drawing was in its central part.

The drawing was created as an illustration for the poem "Maria" by Władysław Broniewski, included in the volume "Ręka umarłej" (Hand of a Deceased) as a poetic commentary on the camp stories of his wife Maria Zarębińska. It depicts a stringed instrument, damaged, with broken, twisted strings; an envelope is visible behind the instrument. It is a rejected version of the illustration. The work published in the book (below the poem, on its second page; the original is not preserved in the artist's archive) differs slightly from this one: there are flowers on the envelope, the number of strings is one less, and they are less twisted.

The composition (both the rejected version and the final published version) is quite loosely related to the content of the poem, perhaps the damaged stringed instrument refers to Zarębińska-Broniewska's acting motif from the second line of the last verse:

"What has this war killed in you?

There is no me, there is no theatre...

I cry to you, my love,

with the call of the wind".

This fragment of the poem also became the motto of the introduction to the volume by Seweryna Szmaglewska (see note to object MPOLIN-M1607).

Przemysław Kaniecki