Barbara Narębska-Dębska, Cathedral in Chełmża, 1955

Aquatint on paper, signed and dated "Barbara Narębska-Dębska 55".

Framed: 71x61 cm (40x30 cm).

Provenance: the equipment of the Bristol Hotel in Warsaw from 1945-65.

Barbara Narębska-Dębska-Kozłowska (Włocławek 1921 - 2000 Aleksandrów Kujawski) - Polish painter, visual artist. Her parents were architect Stefan Narębski and Zofia from Olszakowski. In 1928, the Narębski family lived in Vilnius, where she graduated from the Middle School of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. Initially, she planned to study at the Faculty of Architecture at the Warsaw Polytechnic, but since she was not an adult, she began studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Stefan Batory University. After the outbreak of World War II and the invasion of the Red Army, from December 1939 she continued her education at the Lithuanian Academy of Fine Arts. In 1941, the university was closed, and Barbara Narębska started working as a newspaper distributor, waitress and kitchen help. After the arrest of Stefan Narębski by the NKVD, she tried to intervene, as a result of which she was imprisoned in a prison in Łukiszki, and then, in March 1945, she was deported to the check-and-filter camp of the NKVD no. 0321 in Jełszanka near Saratowa. Released in September 1945, she went to Vilnius, and after getting information about the resettlement of relatives to Toruń, she joined them. From November 1945, she studied at the Department of Fine Arts at the Nicolaus Copernicus University, graduating with a diploma thesis prepared under the guidance of prof. Jerzy Hoppen in 1950. At that time, she joined the Union of Polish Visual Artists and began artistic work and exhibition activities, throughout the period of her studies she worked in the Toruń branch of Cepelia as a decorator. During her studies, in 1947 she married the artillery officer Major Stefan Dębski. In 1956 she became the head of the Bureau of Art Exhibitions and held this position until April 1961, when she began to work as a lecturer at the Department of Flat Forms and Space Forms at the Faculty of Fine Arts at the Nicolaus Copernicus University. In November of the same year, Stefan Dębski died, four years later the artist became involved with the lecturer of the Nicolaus Copernicus University, a plastic artist Józef Kozłowski. In 1968, she obtained a full-time position of an associate professor and took him to retirement in 1976, received a medal at the Nicolaus Copernicus University and completely devoted herself to painting. In January 1979, she suffered a massive brain haemorrhage, which permanently limited her physical fitness, but thanks to long-lasting and intensive rehabilitation she returned to creativity and intellectual life. Barbara Narębska-Dębska initially created etchings and graphics depicting architectural landscapes of Toruń and other cities of Powiśle, among others Kwidzyn, Chełmno, Brodnica and Grudziądz. During her trip to Bulgaria in 1953, she created a series of etchings, and thanks to visiting the surroundings of Zielona Góra, she created drawings and graphics depicting the Lubusz Land. With time, she created her own, geometrized style, characterized by the synthesis of the presented views. After a one-month scholarship stay in Paris in 1957, Barbara Narębska-Dębska turned to a colorful aquamarine, whose use she mastered to perfection. With her help, she created views from Paris and London and a series of rural churches and churches. From the mid-1960s, it sought geometric abstraction in which light was the factor in shaping the composition.