Antoni Wiwulski (original) (raw)

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Polish and Lithuanian architect and sculptor

Antoni Wiwulski
Antoni Wiwulski ca. 1910
Born (1877-02-20)20 February 1877Totma, Totemsky Uyezd, Vologda Governorate, Russian Empire
Died 10 January 1919(1919-01-10) (aged 41)Soviet-occupied Vilnius
Nationality Polish and Lithuanian
Known for Sculpture
Notable work The Grunwald Monument in Kraków, 1910Three Crosses in Vilnius, 1916

Antoni Wiwulski (Lithuanian: Antanas Vivulskis; 20 February 1877 – 10 January 1919) was a Polish-Lithuanian architect and sculptor.[1][2][3]

He was born 20 February 1877 in Totma, in Russia, where his father Antoni, veteran of the January Uprising of 1863, served as a forest superintendent.[4] Both parent were born in Samogitia, his mother Adelajda Karpuszko was able to speak in Samogitian. Antoni Wiwulski graduated from the German gymnasium in Mitau, and later from the reputable Jesuit boarding school in Khyriv. There he met Jan Beyzym, who developed in him a passion for carving.[5] He graduated in 1897[6] and then two of the most prestigious art and architecture universities of the epoch: the École Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the Higher Technical School in Vienna. In Paris he met Władysław Mickiewicz [pl] and, through this acquaintance, Ignacy Paderewski. In July 1908 he stayed at Paderewski's residence in Morges, Switzerland, where the idea of creating a monument commemorating the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Grunwald was born. His work was part of the sculpture event in the art competition at the 1912 Summer Olympics.[7]

Among the most notable of his works are:

The Holy Heart of Jesus' Church was started in 1913 and was the first monumental building created with usage of reinforced concrete in the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Wiwulski, impressed by the possibility of building gigantic buildings with the newly rediscovered material prepared a project of a giant church with a stylised gigantic sculpture of the Creator sitting on the dome. However, the project was discontinued after Wiwulski's death on 10 January 1919.

In 1919, despite suffering from tuberculosis, he volunteered for the Polish militia (Self-Defence of Lithuania and Belarus) and took part in the defence of Vilnius against Bolshevik assault in the early stages of the Polish-Bolshevik War campaigns. He contracted pneumonia while on guard in the Vilnius' suburb of Užupis.[8][9] After his death he was buried in the cellars beneath the church he had designed. When it was converted by the Soviets into a Palace of the Construction Workers in 1964, his ashes were moved to Rasos Cemetery.[10]

  1. ^ Phillips, Charles (1933). Paderewski - The Story of a Modern Immortal. The Macmillan Company. p. 280. ISBN 0-306-77534-4.
  2. ^ Tomas Venclova (2006). "Vilnius/Wilno/Vilna: The Myth of Division and the Myth of Connection". In Cornis-Pope, Marcel; Neubauer, John (eds.). History of the Literary Cultures of East-Central Europe: Junctures and disjunctures in the 19th and 20th centuries. Vol. 2. John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 22–23. ISBN 9789027293404. According to Venclova, Wiwulski represented "the Wilno variant of Polish modernism" and "considered himself to be both a Polish and a Lithuanian artist."
  3. ^ "Antanas Vivulskis". VLE (in Lithuanian). Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos centras. Retrieved 18 June 2022.
  4. ^ Stefański, Krzysztof (2003). "Polish ecclesiastical architecture of the early 20th century - between the new form and national obligation". Centropa: A Journal of Central European Architecture and Related Arts. 3 (3): 249.
  5. ^ Stefański 1994, p. 57.
  6. ^ Korotyński, Władysław. "Antoni Wiwulski". Kurjer Warszawski. 193 (8–10) – via polona.pl.
  7. ^ "Antoni Wiwulski". Olympedia. Retrieved 22 July 2020.
  8. ^ Wiktor Zenonowicz (1986). "Rys życia autora wileńskich Trzech Krzyży (A sketch on the author of Three Crosses)". Nasza Gazeta (in Polish). 8 (547). Archived from the original on 30 November 2005. Retrieved 10 July 2006.
  9. ^ J. Polonus (July 2005). "Grunwaldzkie uroczystości (Anniversary of Grunwald)". Źródło (in Polish). 705 (27): 31–33. Archived from the original on 4 May 2007. Retrieved 10 July 2006.
  10. ^ Katarzyna Deptuła (April 2001). "Cmentarz na Rossie (Rasos Cemetery)". Gazeta Wyborcza (in Polish). Archived from the original on 16 July 2007. Retrieved 10 July 2006.