Obraz, słowo i ornament jako nierozłączna całość w polichromii cerkwi św. Mikołaja Cudotwórcy w Michałowie autorstwa Adama Stalony-Dobrzańskiego

Created in the years 1954–1955, polychrome of the church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in Michałowo is important work of Orthodox art. The interior decoration, both in design and execution, is an individual and complete work of Adam Stalony-Dobrzański. It reveals the most important features of his style, which crystallized in the 50’s. The paintings are filled with quotes from medieval traditions, both Byzantine and Gothic. Adam Stalony-Dobrzański introduced new interpretative qualities and made a synthesis of two traditions – the East and the West, unprecedented in contemporary sacred painting, translated into the language of modernity, and illustrated in his own, innovative way. Along the ornamental stripes of the ornamental decoration, the artist placed hand-painted sequences of letters forming inscriptions – quotations from the Holy Bible, explaining the meaning of figural representations. They complement, explain and develop the ideological meanings shown in the form of an image. The iconographic arrangement of the wall decorations, which is a transformation of the canon formed after iconoclasm in the spaces of cross-domed temples, was adapted to the architecture of the interior of the wooden church, creating a homogeneous and coherent ideological program.