WILANÓW WORKS OF ART IN THE GERMAN CATALOGUE SICHERGESTELLTE KUNSTWERKE IM GENERALGOUVERNEMENT

Abstract

Before the outbreak of WW II, the works of world art collected at the Wilanów Palace were considered to be the largest private collection in the Polish territories. Just the very collection of painting featured 1.200 exhibits. Apart from them the Wilanów collection contained historic furniture, old coins, textiles, artistic craftsmanship items, drawings, and prints, pottery, glassware, silverware, bronzes, sculptures, as well as mementoes of Polish rulers. Already in the first weeks of the German occupation, assigned officials selected the most precious art works from the Wilanów collections, and included them in the Sichergestellte Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue. The publication presented the most precious cultural goods secured by the Germans in the territory of occupied Poland. It included 76 items: 29 paintings and 47 artistic craftsmanship objects. In 1943, the majority of the works included in the quoted Catalogue were transferred to Cracow. A year later, the most valuable exhibits from Wilanów were evacuated to Lower Silesia. What remained in Cracow was only a part of the collection relocated from Wilanów. The chaos of the last weeks preceding the fall of the Third Reich caused that many art works from the Wilanów collection are considered war losses. Among many objects, included in the above Catalogue, there are several Wilanów paintings: Portrait of a Man by Bartholomeus van der Helst, Portrait of a Married Couple by Pieter Nason, Allegory of Architecture, Painting, and Sculpture by Pompeo Batoni, Allegorical Scene in Landscape by Paris Bordone, and The Assumption of Mary by Charles Le Brun.