Objects

The photograph was taken in Zagwoźdz (formerly Stanisławów County) in 1916. Its authorship remains unknown. Perhaps the photograph should be linked to Leopold Węgrzynowicz (1881-1960), who worked as a teacher at junior high schools in, among others, Kuty, Borshchiv (Polish: Borszczów) and Stryj between 1909 and 1918. As a result of his interest in ethnography and sightseeing, he took many photographs documenting the monuments, culture and people of the areas that are now within Ukraine. However, it is now difficult to resolve whether he was the actual author of the photograph depicted or whether he acquired it for his collection. Some clues may also point to Kazimierz Rola-Piekarski (1893-1944), bibliographer and collector, who is known to have donated photographs from Zagwoźdź to the collection of the Ethnographic Museum in Kraków in 1917.

The photograph is a portrait, in a full-frontal view, of an old Jewish man, probably on a fenced farm. The man is sitting on wooden balks. He has a long gray beard and short payot. He is dressed in a dark kaftan and trousers, high boots and a hat. Behind him, there is a wooden picket fence and a spreading deciduous tree in the right part of the frame.