Works by the most eminent Polish maritime artists from the second half of the 19th century to the present day, marinas by foreign artists from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as the “Battle of Oliwa – unfinished sketch” by Marian Mokwa presented to the public for the first time after its conservation… The temporary exhibition, to which the National Maritime Museum in Gdańsk invites from 30 May till 14 September 2025, is an exceptional event for at least several reasons. Although the works on display are striking in their diversity, they share a common denominator: six decades of patronage over the museum’s maritime art collection by the Society of Friends of the National Maritime Museum. By honouring the benefactors in this way, the Museum also wishes to celebrate 65 years of its activity, which began thanks to the Society.
Diversity of maritime art on one exhibition
This jubilee exhibition is a presentation of works selected from those that have enriched the Museum’s collection over the 65 years of its existence thanks to the generosity of the Society of Friends of NMM. The leading painting collection at the NMM is that of Polish marine paintings. Thanks to the Society’s patronage, it includes, among others, paintings by artists educated in Munich – those are represented at the exhibition by Feliks Michał Wygrzywalski’s works. Alongside there are paintings by artists active in the interwar period, such as Włodzimierz Nałęcz, Bronisława Rychter-Janowska and Abraham Neuman. The post-war achievements of Polish maritime art are showcased by works of Marian Mokwa and Henryk Baranowski as well as artists associated with the Gdańsk Academy of Fine Arts such as Kazimierz Ostrowski, Mieczysław Baryłko and Czesław Tumielewicz,. Classical antiquity is referred to in “Ariadne’s Dream” by Stanisław Teisseyre and “Scylla and Charybdis” by Tomasz Sętowski – a representative of the so-called magical realism trend in contemporary painting. The collection of works by foreign artists, funded for the Museum by the Society, is represented by Gustave de Bréanski’s North Sea coastal landscape, as well as a turn-of-the-century view of Gdańsk by Harry Schultz and a view of Hel by Fritz Raupp. The exhibition’s aesthetics is complemented by sculptures by contemporary Polish artists: Irena Loroch and Anna Maria Strzelczyk.
Marian Mokwa’s “Battle of Oliwa…” premiere after restoration
As important as the acquisition of new artworks for the collection is securing the appropriate conservation care for those already in our possession. In this area also, the Society of Friends of the National Maritime Museum significantly supports our institution. Last year, thanks to its generosity, the complex and costly conservation of Marian Mokwa’s painting “Battle of Oliwa – unfinished sketch” was carried out. The painting was probably created around 1935 and was intended to be part of a polyptych dedicated to the Battle of Oliwa. Presumably it was cut into several pieces during World War II. In the 1970s it underwent restoration, but the technologies available at the time did not make it possible to protect the work effectively and for a long time. It was not until the conservation funded by the Society of Friends, carried out by the Cardas True Art company from Bydgoszcz, that the painting was properly repaired and secured for the future. “The Battle of Oliwa…” is one of the highlights of the exhibition.
“Benefactors on board…” and much more
The long-standing patronage of the Society of Friends of the NMM includes a much broader collection of paintings; the visitors can admire its most outstanding examples on a daily basis at the Museum’s permanent exhibitions. These include Jacek Malczewski’s “Portrait of a Lady by the Sea”, the acquisition of which was co-financed by the Society and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, and two paintings by Jan Theuniszoon Blankerhoff, which are the pride of the Museum’s collection of seventeenth-century Dutch marinas. Nineteenth-century Gdańsk, on the other hand, is shown by Alfred Scherres’ atmospheric “Nocturne”. These works can be seen in the Maritime Gallery – the permanent exhibition located next door to the “Benefactors on Board…”. Meanwhile, Josef Carl Barthold Püttner’s painting “The Battle of Heligoland”, which comes from the collection of the Żywiec branch of the Habsburg family, is presented in the part of the permanent exhibition devoted to the fate of Poles under the partitions, and Kazimierz Śramkiewicz’s painting “Northern Port XII” – in the hall dedicated to maritime economy during Polish People’s Republic period.
Society of Friends of NMM for the future
In 2023, thanks to the generosity of the Society, it was possible to restore six unique drawings by Mariusz Zaruski, probably his only artworks preserved in any museum collections. The Society continues to support the Museum – this year it is financing the conservation of a set of particularly endangered etchings and drawings and an illustrated manuscript on tracing paper by Michał Leszczyński-Lester. The Society’s patronage of the painting collection, although very significant in itself, is only one aspect of the comprehensive work of this organisation for the Museum, which owes its very establishment to the activities of the Society.
Curators: Dr Monika Jankiewicz-Brzostowska and Zuzanna Mikołajek-Kiełb.
Media patronage: Radio Gdańsk S.A., Trojmiasto.pl
Benefactors on Board. Patronage of the Society of Friends of the National Maritime Museum over the Museum’s painting collection
30.05.2025 – 14.09.2025
National Maritime Museum
