Atrybucja obrazów z kościoła opackiego w Starym Dworku

The works of Szymon Czechowicz (there are hundreds of them) are not fully recognized and in many cases, it is only possible to attribute them to him through the analysis of his existing works or fragmentary source information. One of such paintings is the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the high altar in the post-Cistercian church in Obra. The attribution of the painting mentioned above was established thanks to the published note written by Piotr Widawski SOC, the last prior of the monastery in Bledzew. According to Widawski, the painting was done in 1759, and it was commissioned by the Obra Abbot Józef Michał Loka, who in the same year, was elected to be the abbot of the monastery in Bledzew, the position he had striven for since 1742. During a few years of his staying in Bledzew, Abbot Loka commenced building monastery wings and completed the church (Marian sanctuary) in Rokitno, as well as building and decorating the church in Nowa Wieś. He also, as the contemporary note says, ‘prepared the material for the construction of a residence in Stary Dworek’ and thanks to him and his financial support ‘all building materials for the construction of the church in Stary Dworek were prepared and delivered’. Three easel paintings of high artistic value in moulded frames are parts of the altars in the church devoted to St Joseph, the patron of Abbot Loka, in Stary Dwór. Two of them, the large format canvases, one of which depicts The Vision of St Bernard of Clairvaux and the other The Adoration of the Cross by St John of Nepomuk, display features characteristic of the oeuvre of Szymon Czechowicz. The third of the paintings in the church in Stary Dwór, presenting St Joseph with the Baby Jesus, is heavily over-painted, which makes Czechowicz’s painting features more difficult to perceive; the painting, however, remains in the convention of the painter’s style. The article does not settle the question of the canvases’ attribution; it only aims to draw attention to these forgotten works of art, whose condition can result in their destruction, which would be a serious loss to the art of this region.