Adolf Hyła

Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association

Dear readers,

We wanted to examine the human aspect, based on the cult of the image of Divi- ne Mercy. The painting of Christ from under Adolf Hyła’s brush is now famous all over the world and it is one of the most famous paintings of the Risen Jesus. However, only few people are aware of the history of this painting. The first pain- ting inspired by the revelations of Saint Maria Faustyna Kowalska was done by Euge- niusz Kazimirowski, and is now located in Vilnius. It did not receive wider recognition. Faustyna Kowalska herself was not entirely convinced of the accuracy of the depic- tion of Christ, furthermore, the tempestuous period of history ultimately determined the location of the painting outside of . The author of the second image of Merciful Jesus was an artist from , Stanisław Batowski. His painting is currently located in the Church of Divine Mercy at Smolensk street in Krakow. We, on the other hand, want to tell you the story of the author of the most famous depiction of Merciful Christ, which can be found in Krakow’s Łagiewniki Sanctuary. What’s so special about the painting? It’s hard to pinpoint a single thing. It was pain- ted and donated as a votive offering for saving the painter’s family from the horrors of war. Thanks to the help of Adolf Hyła’s family, we were able to collect mementos, documents, and his non-sacral paintings. We want to present this artist as a man of many passions; to show his work and emphasize the fact that the Divine Mercy painting has an author. Adolf Hyła has been commemorated for several years. In 2013, the City Council of Krakow decided to name an alleyway by the Łagiewniki Sanctuary after the author. In 2017, our association was established, and during the same year, the Voivodeship Council of Lesser Poland adopted a resolution of Hyła’s commemoration. The curator of Adolf Hyła’s commemoration is his niece, Doctor Elżbieta Szczepaniec-Cięciak. We also have to mention Fr. prof. Andrzej Witko, expert in the cult of God’s Mercy and the cult of St. Faustina, as well as Fr. dr. Piotr Szwed MS, whose scientific work is dedicated to Adolf Hyła.

With sincere regards, Jan Cięciak President of the Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association

Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association

Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association

Family

Adolf Kazimierz Hyła was born on May 2, 1897 in Biała near Bielsko, as the firstborn son of Jozef and Salomea, née Szarkiewicz. His father, Józef Hyła, son of Stefan and Rozalia, was born on December 27, 1857 in the village of Hucisko near Żywiec. Adolf’s mother, Salomea, was the daughter of Jan Szarkiewicz and Maria née Słowińska, of Wojnicz in Tarnów County. She was born on August 29, 1875. Adolf’s parents died in 1940; mother on October 11, and father on November 15. The family was moving numerous times. After the birth of Adolf, they settled in Krakow. They changed their addresses many times, from Wielopole St., through Kołłątaja and Św. Łazarza St. and then again to Kołłątaja St., always near the post office where Józef Hyła worked – initially as a postman, and then as a postal clerk. Adolf grew up with his siblings: Stefan, Maria Waleria, Helena, Aniela, Antoni and

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Michał, Irena and Jerzy. They lived modestly, as all the household earnings were coming from his father, while mother was taking care of the children. Later, this responsibility was shared by their firstborn daughter, Maria Waleria. Loved by all the children, she became the truly-adored auntie Marila for the next generation of the Hyła family. Until the very end, she remained in the apartment at St. Sebastian’s 12, together with her youngest sister Irena, whose children she was also taking care of, and whose family she supported financially. She brought help to everyone in need, both during the Nazi occupation and after the war. Adolf, however, did not stay long with his family. He left home as the first of the siblings. As a fifteen-year-old, he set out to study.

Education Adolf Hyła attended the St. Barbara Men’s Common School in Krakow, located on the Small Market 8, in the years 1903-1907. It was a four-year common school that prepared for secondary education in gymnasiums (equivalent to grammar schools). In the years 1907-1912, he attended the St. Jack’s Imperial-Royal Gymnasium in Krakow. The future painter originally studied in the subsidiary of the gymnasium at St. Sebastian’s 12 street, where he graduated classes 1-4 (the so-called lower

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gymnasium), then he attended 5th class in the school located at Sienna 13. St. Jack’s Gymnasium in Krakow during that period of time was a prestigious, eight-grade school, also called a classical school, where he was learning Latin and Greek, as his sixth-form subjects. Young Hyła inherited the talent for drawing from his father, who often painted in spare time, decorating the furniture of the apartment at Kołłątaja St. with beautiful floral patterns. On July 11, 1912, Adolf entered a Boarding School of Jesuits in Stara Wieś near Brzozów, where they ran a junior gymnasium for young friars. Adolf Hyła graduated the fourth grade of junior gymnasium in Velehrad, Moravia. During World War I, the novitiate and the gymnasium of the Galician Province for clerics and young people from Stara Wieś and Chyrowo were established there. On July 17, 1914, Adolf Hyła received his lower ordination and tonsure from Bishop Józef Sebastian Pelczar (document dated August 2, 1915). In the years 1915 - 1917, he studied at the Jesuitian Private Secondary School in Bąkowice near Chyrow, which then was a province of Lviv. The Chyrow gymnasium was considered the best equipped school in Poland during the second Polish Republic. It was where Hyła graduated seventh and eighth grade of the gymnasium and passed the matriculation exam on May 28-30, 1917. He studied philosophy at the Philosophical College of Jesuits in Nowy Sącz for the next year. However, he left the order before finishing the studies, on December 2, 1918. From February 5, 1919 to November 24, 1920, he intermittently served in the Polish army. From May 1 to December 31, 1919, he worked in the Kilimkami Drawing Office of the National Industrial Union in Krakow.

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In the academic year 1919/1920, he enrolled at the Faculty of Law of the Jagiellonian University. He didn’t finish those studies either, this time because of the military service. He enrolled at the Jagiellonian University again in the academic year 1922/1923, at the Faculty of Philosophy. During the first year of his studies, he took classes in inorganic and analytical chemistry, mineralogy, petrography, philosophy, ethics, and art history. He quit again after three trimesters of the first year. The several months spent working in the Kilimkami Drawing Office of the National Industrial Union in Krakow significantly influenced the life of Adolf Hyła. At the time, count Leonard Mieroszewski recognized the young man’s great painting abilities thanks to the portrait of Marshal Józef Piłsudski and ordered his own portrait from Hyła. The count surrounded Hyła with cordial care and sent him to the studio of the famous Young Poland painter - Jacek Malczewski. Adolf became his private student – the talent and artistic personality of the young painter matured and developed under the guidance of the great artist.

Teacher and mentor For more than twenty years, Adolf Hyła was working as a teacher of drawing, handwork and other subjects of secondary education. He first was teaching drawing and mathematics, physics and geography at the private Jadwiga Krzymowska

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Women’s Gymnasium in Będzin (from December 2, 1920 to April 30, 1928), then drawing and mathematics at the Men’s Gymnasium and the Merchants’ Assembly Commercial Lyceum in Będzin (from September 1 to July 31, 1936; in 1934 the school was renamed to Nicolaus Copernicus Coeducational Gymnasium in Będzin). 32-year-old Adolf married Maria Katarzyna Zalipska, daughter of Tomasz and Klementyna, née Rozmanit. The ceremony took place in the Church of St. Nicholas in Krakow. Maria, Adolf’s wife, worked as a bank clerk. They didn’t have any children. The wife’s family was very religious. During this hard period for the entire Polish

society, they found help and support in the . In 1936, Hyła finished work in Będzin and began teaching practical classes at the A. Witkowski 8th State Lyceum and Gymnasium in Krakow, in addition, he started working at the 9th Gymnasium of Mathematics and Natural Sciences named after J. M. Hoene-Wronski. After a hiatus caused by the Nazi occupation, he returned to the Witkowski Lyceum and Gymnasium teaching practical classes (1945-1948, with gaps for sick leaves). Due to ill health confirmed by a medical commission report, on April 30, 1948 Adolf Hyła ended his career as a teacher. Since then, he was completely devoted to painting. Work in the teaching profession always required continuous self-education and improvement. As early as 1921, Adolf Hyła already took part in a National Summer Course for Secondary and Higher Education Teachers in Kielce, organized by the

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municipal branch of the Society of Secondary and Higher Education Teachers (from 4 July to 13 August). He enhanced his knowledge in chemistry, physics and mineralogy. In order to obtain a full-time position as teacher under the decree of the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education of April 4, 1930, he took an art exam for teachers of drawing in May 1930, held by the State Examination Committee at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, whose president at the time was professor Konstanty Laszczka, a sculptor. The exam lasted from 19 to 27 May 1930. From 3 to 29 August 1931, Adolf Hyła, as a teacher of the Merchants’ Assembly Gymnasium in Będzin, enrolled for the National Summer Course for Secondary School Teachers in Żywiec. In 1936 he passed another exam for a teacher of practical classes (handwork and drawing) at the National Institute of Handwork in . He repeatedly participated in summer courses held by the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education, learning chemistry, mechanics, physical exercises, mineralogy, and handicrafts.

Pedagogical and artistic success in Będzin Adolf Hyła was respected in Dąbrowa Basin not only as an outstanding teacher of drawing and educator of young people, to whom he was imparting knowledge as well as artistic passion, but also as a painter, member of the Artistic and Literary Society (TAL) in Sosnowiec, author of works that caught attention and gained recognition at exhibitions with striking compositions, originality, and sheer artistic ingenuity. Hyła exhibited his works annually in the entire region of Dąbrowa Basin on exhibitions held by the Silesian Exhibition Society, based in Katowice. A journalist of „Western Courier” praised an exhibition in Sosnowiec for a truly admirable artistic value, in an issue dated 20 October 1929, listing Hyła’s paintings among those which spurred the greatest interest, both in terms of subject matter and artistic quality. In the report from the first exhibition of painters from south Poland (Silesia, Krakow, Dąbrowa Basin, and Podhale), organized on a very large scale by the Silesian Society of Exhibitions between December 15, 1928 and January 2, 1929, reviewer J. Gawlikowski wrote: „A truly beautiful pastel drawing from the Sosnowiec group, by Hyła, entitled »Sheep«. It truly emanates the author’s interest and passion for finding the new.” („Polonia,” dated December 21, 1928). The exhibition of works by Adolf Hyła’s students from the Jadwiga Krzymowska Female Gymnasium in Będzin is highly appreciated and praised. Students exhibit drawings of geometric solids, still

10 Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association lifes, theoretical perspective drawings, decorative drawings, watercolor illustrations of personal experiences, genre paintings, and stained glass. There were drawings and paintings made with pencil, sangwina, color and black crayons, ink, and watercolor („Western Courier” of October 21, 1928).

Interests outside art Adolf Hyła was a great enthusiast of lowland and mountain tourism, kayaking, and skiing. He organized a skiing association in the Men’s Gymnasium and Commerce Lyceum of the Merchants Assembly in Będzin. He was also an avid motorcyclist, he belonged to the Automobile Club. He went on a famous honeymoon with his wife Maria. They rode to Italy on a motorcycle of English production with a sidecar. They were also often going on motorcycle sightseeing trips and plein air painting in the mountains or by the sea. In 1962, as an older, sixty-five-year-old gentleman, he bought a new Junak M10 with a sidecar. The motorcycle fascinated boys from the neighboring houses. Adolf Hyła was also a fond photographer – he photographed his paintings himself. As a bibliophile and erudite, he was also interested in the latest feats of technology. He used the epidiascope as an auxiliary device in his painting process. As a teacher, he engaged in voluntary local community work. In 1929, Adolf Hyła received the Medal of Decade of Independence Regained. He also received the badge „For Selfless Work” in the Będzin district as a senior Census Commissioner during the second general census of the Polish population in 1931. In 1935, he was awarded the National Sports Badge of class 11, grade I.

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Resident of Kraków Łagiewniki Adolf Hyła with his wife Maria, mother-in-law Klementyna Zalipska and in-law Włodzimierz Zalipski, who lived with them after fleeing Lublin, right at the beginning of World War II, after being displaced by the occupiers from their apartment at Słowacki avenue, found refuge in Krakow’s district of Łagiewniki. They were living in a cottage at Orkana 479 street (currently Urocza 36), a short distance from the convent of the congregation of the sisters of Our Lady of Mercy. From that moment on, their lives became closely intertwined with the fate of the . The years of occupation were a period of very intensive painting for Adolf Hyła. During that time, he completed a series of family portraits, and painted images of the Divine Mercy. The beginning of the war and occupation brought painful losses to the family. A few days after the invasion of the Soviet Union on Poland (September 17, 1939) Adolf’s youngest brother, Jerzy, a graduate of mathematics at the Faculty of Philosophy of the Jagiellonian University, died as a sub-lieutenant of the 82nd Infantry Regiment, on September 24, 1939 in the battles with the Bolsheviks at the railway station in the village of Iwanycze near Włodzimierz (today Ukraine). A year later, Adolf’s parents died almost simultaneously: Salomea Hyła – on October 11, and Józef Hyła – on November 15, 1940. Other family members survived the war. Among them was also the brother of Adolf, Michael (1908-1979), who fought in the

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battle of Monte Cassino in 1944 in 2nd Polish Corp under general Anders. Adolf Hyła was among the fortunate survivors, until the war outbreak a professor of the A. Witkowski 8th Lyceum and Gymnasium in Krakow and his brother-in-law, doctor Włodzimierz Zalipski, chairman of the District Court in Lublin during the trials against German saboteurs conducted immediately before the outbreak of World War II. Wanted by the Gestapo, he left Nazi-occupied Lublin in October 1939, leaving all his possessions, and settled with his family in Krakow. The first large-scale arrests of teachers were conducted in Krakow in November 1939. Two dates are significant, described in detail in the scientific and historical literature: November 6 and November 9, 1939 – Sonderaktion Krakau and Zweite Sonderaktion Krakau. Adolf Hyła was probably saved from the arrest by moving to Łagiewniki. In 1942, Adolf Hyła turned to Fr. Józef Andrasz SJ, former spiritual director and confessor of Sister Faustyna Kowalska (1905-1938), with a proposal to paint a picture for the chapel of the congregation of the sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in Łagiewniki. The votive painting was supposed to be a token of gratitude for saving his family during the war. This event took place four years after the death of Sister Faustina Kowalska, a nun from the congregation of the Sisters Of Our Lady Of Mercy, who had spent 13 years of her life in the monastery and died in sainthood on October 5, 1938, at only 33 years of age. Father Andras, after consulting the sisters, proposed he painted a picture of Divine Mercy. The first Divine Mercy painting was created in Vilnius in 1934, painted by Eugeniusz Kazimirowski with direct involvement of Sister Faustyna Kowalska and assistance of Fr. Michał Sopoćko, confessor and the sister’s spiritual director in Vilnius. Kazimirowski began work on the painting on January 2, 1934, according to the revelation that Sister Faustina had almost two years earlier in Płock, and in accordance with the command of Jesus: „Paint the picture according to the drawing that you see, with the inscription: Jesus, I trust in You.” In the visions of Sister Faustina, Jesus repeatedly urged her to perform this task, but it was only for Fr. Michał Sopoćko’s help that it was completed, as he knew the artist well and lived next door to him in Vilnius at Rossa 2 street. He funded the painting with his own money, attended meetings of Sister Faustina with the artist, and even posed for the painter himself to render the posture of Jesus and the arrangement of his robe. They say the hands of Jesus in the painting are the hands of the priest as well. The painting was completed in June 1934, but Sister Faustina lamented that Jesus in the painting was not as beautiful as when

14 Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association he appeared before her, and it was only for Jesus’ reassurance that „Not in the beauty of the colour, nor of the brush lies the greatness of this image, but in My grace.” Adolf Hyła, after receiving a copy of a fragment of Sister Faustina’s diary and a copy of the Vilnius painting of Divine Mercy, completed by the female painter Łucja Bałzukiewicz, who lived in Vilnius at that time, began his own painting in November 1942 and soon finished the work. The superior of the Krakow convent of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, sister Irena Krzyżanowska and sister Kaliksta Piekarczyk declared that Hyła’s painting was not suitable for public worship. The artist improved it according to the guidelines provided by Fr. Andrasz, who on March 7, 1943 made a solemn consecration of the image of Divine Mercy. Five months later, on October 6, 1943, a painting by an artist from Lviv, Stanisław Batowski, commissioned by the superior general of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in Warsaw arrived in Łagiewniki. This artist painted the image of Divine Mercy in 1942, to be located in the chapel of the Congregation in Warsaw at Żytnia 3/9 Street. The sisters liked it very much, so the superior general of the Congregation ordered the second painting from the same artist for the chapel in Krakow Łagiewniki. This generated a serious problem: which painting should be displayed in Łagiewniki chapel, the one by Hyła, or Batowski? The issue was actually resolved by Cardinal during an unexpected visit to the monastery. After seeing both images he said that „If the painting by Mr. Hyla is his own votive offering, let it be the one hung in the chapel.” And so it was, in a side altar on it’s eastern side. On every month’s third Sunday, in turn, on Divine Mercy celebration, the painting was moved to the side altar on the opposite side of the chapel. Hyła’s painting was done on a rectangular canvas, so it didn’t fit the shape of the reredos, which was topped with an oval. The artist was asked to complete a second painting, this time in a shape corresponding to that of the altar. He was also asked to introduce a few changes, such as more Semitic appearance, blacker hair, transparent robes and a stern mien. And so the second variant of Hyła’s Łagiewniki painting was created. On April 15, 1944 Adolf Hyła delivered a new painting, adapted to the shape of the side altar. The next day, the Octave Day of Easter, when Divine Mercy was celebrated for the first time, Fr. Józef Andrasz consecrated the painting. Both the

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16 Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association first and second Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association painting of Adolf Hyła depicted Jesus as a „divine physician,” going through the world to cure the ills of mankind and endow it with his mercy. This is how Fr. Józef Andrasz, Krakow confessor of Sister Faustina interpreted the idea of Divine Mercy. Not only Fr. Józef Andrasz, who oversaw the creation of the painting, but also Adolf Hyła had a broad understanding of the idea of Merci depicted therein. They did not narrow it down to establishing the sacrament of atonement, as Fr. Sopoćko did. Therefore, in the background of the figure of Jesus, Hyła included the landscape of the area for which he created the painting. Jesus, as the Divine Physician, crosses the face of the earth, healing all human miseries with mercy. The painting by Stanisław Batowski is located in the Church of Divine Mercy in Krakow at Smolensk street, while Adolf Hyła’s original painting was relocated to a new convent in Wroclaw by mother Irena Krzyżanowska in 1946. This painting is placed in the Wrocław Parish Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Fr. Michał Sopoćko, the Vilnius confessor of Sister Faustina, sharply criticized the painting by Hyła as not liturgical and non-evangelical. According to Fr. Sopoćko, the painting should have depicted Christ as he appeared to the apostles on the day of Resurrection in the Cenacle, his gaze was to be „as from the cross,” that is, directed downwards; moreover, the Savior’s hand was supposed to be raised to the height of the shoulder, not the forehead. Adolf Hyła yielded under considerable pressure and repainted the background of the Łagiewniki painting that presented the local landscape. A stone floor and a dark plane of the background replaced the flowering meadow, forest and hills. Thus, the vision of the Cenacle was invoked. According to some sources, this happened in 1952, and according to others, in 1954. The second version is more likely. Already in the years of the Second World War, the Łagiewniki Monastery became not only a place of worship, but also a center for the propagation of devotion to Divine Mercy in the forms proposed by Sister Faustina. These new forms of the worship of Divine Mercy were the image of Divine Mercy, the Feast of Mercy, the Chaplet of the Divine Mercy, the Hour of Mercy, and the propagation of the worship of Divine Mercy. The painting of Divine Mercy by Adolf Hyła in the chapel of the congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in Kraków-Łagiewniki quickly became famous for its graces, and its copies and reproductions were spreading all over the world. The late 1940s and 50s are a period of intensified work for Adolf. He received numerous

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requests from churches in Poland and abroad for Divine Mercy paintings, as well as other religious images. They were also ordered by priests going on missions. Upon learning on 21 October 1965 that, per the instructions of Metropolitan Bishop of Krakow, Karol Wojtyła, the process of Sister Faustina have begun, Adolf Hyła transferred the formal ownership of the image of Divine Mercy hung in the chapel of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy to the monastery in Łagiewniki, with a formal notary deed. The artist wanted the proceeds from the publication of his painting to be donated to the process of Sister Faustina. Adolf Hyła did not live to see the completion of the beatification of Faustina Kowalska, nor the cancellation of the notification of the Holy Office. (In 1978, at the request of Cardinal Karol Wojtyła, the notification prohibiting the propagation of the cult of Divine Mercy in the forms derived from the revelations of Sister Faustina was revoked. This notification had been issued in 1959. It resulted in the image of Divine Mercy being removed from many churches). After many years of laborious work in toxic fumes of the chemicals contained in paints and solvents, the artist’s health deteriorated increasingly.

Paintings, portraits, and landscapes by Adolf Hyła Adolf Hyła had begun painting at a very young age as a Gymnasium student, and then as a Jesuit cleric. One of his early works was a gift to the Action Committee for the benefit of poor students of secondary schools in Lviv, for which he made an oil painting on canvas, depicting Madonna and Child according to Carlo Dolci. Adolf Hyła’s artistic output included nearly seven hundred paintings, mainly religious ones, to which he devoted the last quarter of his life. During this period, he lived in Kraków-Łagiewniki at the street currently known as Urocza, number 36, near the convent of the Sisters of the Congregation of Our Lady of Mercy. Most of the religious paintings depicted the Divine Mercy – he completed more than two hundred and thirty such paintings. Adolf Hyła’s output also includes dozens of portraits and a number of landscapes. Paintings from the early period of his work are found in the homes of the descendants of his siblings; they’re often not dated. Some of Hyła’s paintings are also owned by his wife’s relatives. The paintings created in the 1940s and later, on the other hand, are found in many churches and around Poland and in the world, often

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in very exotic locations visited by Polish missions. Some of these paintings changed locations several times during the decades following their creation. Adolf Hyła painted dozens of portraits, which can be divided into three categories: portraits of famous and prominent figures of the church, family portraits, and portraits of regular people, most often commissioned. The portraits of famous Poles include images of Piotr Skarga, Tadeusz Kościuszko, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Józef Piłsudski, Józef Haller. Portraits of: Pope Benedict XV; the Superior General of the , the Very Rev. Włodzimierz Ledóchowski, S.J.; the founder of the Sisters of the Most Holy Soul of Christ the Lord, Mother Zofia Paula Tajber; Capuchin Provincials: Fr. Kazimierz Niczyński, Fr. Alojzy Wojnar, Fr. Remigius Krańca, and Fr. Ernest Łanucha, as well as Fr. Pius Pawełek from the Congregation of the Mission, and Fr. Rafał Chyliński all consist in the group of portraits depicting figures of the Church. Adolf Hyła painted a dozen or so family portraits, often gifts to his friends and relatives on formal occasions. These include portraits of the parents of Salomea and Józef Hyła (two portraits of the mother and three portraits of the father), sisters: Maria Hylovna (two portraits) and Irena Szczepaniec (1940), brothers: Stefan (two portraits) and Jerzy (1939), wife Maria Hylova (1944), mother-in-law Klementyna Zalipska (1934, 1950), brother-in-law Włodzimierz Zalipski (1944), children of brother Stefan: Maciej and Wojciech Hyła (two portraits), Peter, son of brother Antoni, as well as daughter of Sister Irena, Elżbieta Szczepaniec (Adolf was her godfather).

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Some of Hyła’s paintings were commissioned portraits, or gifts to his acquaintances. These include portraits of Janina Mirocka, Irena Kleszczyńska, Janina Halska, Aleksandra Łukowicz, Barbara Niessner-hoszowska (pastel from childhood), Jerzy Fürstenberg, Stanisław Tokarski, Czesław Kozłowski, Jerzy Kozłowski, Karol Kobiemicki, Wincenty Bogdanowski. Adolf Hyła also painted self-portraits: two are oil paintings on canvas, the third is painted in ink on cardboard. Adolf Hyła painted several landscapes: St. Mary’s Church in Krakow (1926), Forum Romanum (1931), Church in Obidowa (1934), Świnica mountainside and Gąsienicowe Lake in the Tatras (1936), Czarny Dunajec river in Witów (1937), the Krakow Gorge in the Kościeliska Valley (1947), Seaside in Orłów (1947), Bystry Creek in winter (1951), Wybrzeże Sopockie (1958), Kościelec mountain, forest in Wróblowice, forest in Jugowice, Spring at Wilga, numerous landscapes from Tatra mountains, and a series of landscapes completed on canvas and on cardboards during his beloved hikings trips and tours. As years went by, the artist became increasingly devoted to sacral works. He painted saints and blesseds: St. Joseph for the church of Jesuits in Poznanń, St. Anthony of Padua with Baby Jesus and angel’s heads for the Holy Trinity Church in Gdańsk, St. Joseph with Baby Jesus and St. Teresa for the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw, St. Jerome for Fr. Prof. Jana Czuj in Warsaw, St. , St. Wenceslaus, St. Maria Goretti, St. Fastina Kowalska (canonized in the year 2000), St. Andrew Bobola, St. Anthony of Padua, Blessed Angela Salawa (beatified in 1991), St. Anne, St. Barbra, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Brother (canonized in 1989), Blessed Bernardyna Maria Jabłońska (beatified in 1997), St. John the Baptist, St. Casimir, St. Francis Xavier, St. Stanislaus Kostka, St. Gregory the Great, St. Hieronimus, St. Pius X, St. Jude the Apostle, St. Vincent Palotti, Blessed Melchor Chyliński (beatified in 1991), St. Padre Pio (canonized in 2002). In Adolf Hyla’s artistic output, the paintings of the Mother of God occupy a prominent spot. These include paintings of the Immaculate Conception, the Annunciation, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Our Lady of Czestochowa, Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn, Our Lady of Fatima (nineteen paintings!), Our Lady of the Scapular, Our Lady of Sorrows, Our Lady of Perpetual Help, Our Lady of the Souls in Purgatory for the church in Sonntag, Austria. Adolf Hyła also depicted the Heart of the Lord Jesus, and the Lord Jesus Radiating in his paintings. The location of many of Adolf Hyła’s religious paintings is given by Father Piotr Szwed in his monograph about the artist.

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Hyła was also a copyist. He made copies of religious paintings by the great Rafael Santi’s Madonna della Sedia, Carl Dolci’s Mater Dolorosa and Madonna Lacrimosa, Anthony van Dyck’s Madonna and Child, Bartolomeo Murilla’s St. , Giambattista Pittoni’s Annunciation, and Fritz Kunz’ Stigmatization of St.Francis.

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Death and funeral of Adolf Hyła Adolf Hyła died in Krakow on Christmas Day, Friday, , 1965. He was 68 years old. The cause of death was a stroke in the left hemisphere of the brain, causing right-sided paralysis. Then came pneumonia with a very high fever – over 41° C (106° F). Hyła loses consciousness and never regains it before dying. All the efforts and constant vigil of physician Zygmunt Łuczyński were futile. The sacrament of the last anointing was given by the parson of the Parish of Sacred Heart of Jesus in Łagiewniki, Fr. Józef Zwardon. It was the premature death of an incredibly prolific artist, who created hundreds of religious paintings during the quarter of a century he spent in Łagiewniki. Gone was the painter of the Merciful Jesus, who made the image of Divine Mercy famous, bringing thousands of believers and converts closer to God. The Funeral Mass intended for the soul of late Adolfa Hyła was celebrated on December 28, at 9 o’clock in the morning in the chapel of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in Łagiewniki. The funeral took place on 29 December at 11 a.m. at the in Krakow. It was a very solemn mass, with

participation of numerous church dignitaries, delegations of many orders and crowds of ordinary residents of Łagiewniki and the city of Krakow, as well as relatives. Adolf Hyła was temporarily buried in a rented tomb, the so-called „catacomb of free.” On October 29, 1966, his body was laid to the Tomb of the Zalipski family, located in grave No. 9 in the Western Bc quarter of the Rakowicki cemetery.

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Edited by: Jan Cięciak, Gabriel Szuster, Maria Świgost

Corrected by: Konrad Piowarczyk

Graphic design and composition by: Marcin Smolski

Photo Sources: archiwum rodzinne

Translation by: Jakub Nowak

The publication is co-financed by the City of Krakow

© Copyright by Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association

www.hyla.org.pl, e-mail: [email protected] All rights reserved Kraków 2020 ISBN: 978-83-948850-2-1 The Adolf Hyła Cultural and Educational Association was established in 2017 to com- memorate the artist’s 120th birthday. Since then, we have been realizing two projects: “Adolf Hyła Unknown,” devoted to his life and work, and a year-round program aimed at improving safety and promoting nature conservancy in the Tatras, called “Safe and Cautious in the Tatra Mountains.” In 2019, having completed the projects “Safe and Cautious in the Tatra Mountains,” “Orla Perć – Tradition and Modernity,” and “Safe and Cautious in the Tatra Mountains in Winter,” we released a brochure entitled “Hiker’s ABC for Tatras,” which, under the auspi- ce of the Tatra National Park, was distributed free of charge at park entrances.

Jan Cięciak President of the Adolfa Hyła Cultural and Educational Association