completed his studies. Self-educated in photography.
Engaged to be married in 1914, but his fiance ́e com-
mitted suicide. Accompanied anthropologist, Bronislaw
Malinowski, to Australia and Papua New Guinea as a
photographer and draftsman. Served as an officer in the
Pavlovsky regiment in the Russian military during
World War I and remained enlisted through the Russian
Revolution. Returned to newly independent Poland
where he devoted his life to photography, painting,
drama, novels, and philosophy. PublishedNew Forms
in Painting, outlining his theories of painting and art,- Founded a portrait firm abandoning ‘‘artistic’’
painting, 1924. Organized an amateur avant-garde for-
mist theater, 1925. Completed his magnum opus in phi-
losophy entitled,The Concepts and Principles Implied by
the Concept of Existence, 1935.
Permanent Exhibition
Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz photography Museum Tatr-
zanskie
Individual Exhibitions
1979 Witkacy photographs; Museum of Art, odz, Poland
1980 Witkacy Retrospective; Museum of Art, odz, Poland
1985, 1989Witkacy in the Worldfrom the collections of
Professor Janusz Deglar (Witkacy na s ́wiecieze zbioro ́w
prof. Janusza Deglera);
1988 Photographs from the collections of Ewa Franczak and
Stefan Okolowicz,(Fotografie ze zbioro ́w Ewy Franczak i
Stefana Okoowicza); Zakopane, Poland
1988 Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz—Life(Stanisaw Ignacy
Witkiewicz—Zycie); Zakopane, Poland
1993 Insatiability—drawing, painting, photography(Nienasy-
cenie—rysunek, malarstwo, fotografia); Zakopane, Poland
1998 Photography by Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz ‘‘Witk-
acy’’ (1885–1939); Robert Miller Gallery, New York,
New York
2000 Konteksty, Malinowski-Witkacy Photography: Between
Science and Art; Cracow and Warsaw, Poland
2001 Witkacy, Signal de alarma;. Galeria Studio, Warsaw,
Poland
2002 Das zweite Gesicht: Metamorphosen des fotografischen
Portra ̈ts; Deutsches Museum, Berlin, GermanyFurther Reading
Benedyktowicz, Zbigniew, ed.Konteksty, Malinowski-Witk-
acy Photography: Between Science and Art. Krakow:
2000.
Czaroryska, Urszula, Stefan Okolowicz, T. O. Immisch,
Klaus E. Goltz, and Ulrich Pohlmann, eds.Witkacy:
Metaphysical Portraits, Photographs 1910–1939.Robert
Miller Gallery. New York: Art Publishers Inc., 1999.
Gerould, Daniel.Witkacy. Seattle and London: University
of Washington Press, 1981.
Okoowicz, Stefan, and Ewa Franczak.Przeciw Nicos ́ci.
Cracow; 1986.
Piotrowski, Piotr. ‘‘Art in the Crucible of History: Witk-
acy’s Theory and Practice of Painting.’’ The Polish
Reviewvol. XXXIII no. 2 (1988): 123–142.
Polish Review. Special Witkiewicz issue. vol. 18, no. 1–2
(1973).
Zakiewicz, Anna. Witkacy. Slupsk: Museum Pomorze
Srodkowego, 2000.JOEL-PETER WITKIN
American
The photographs of Joel-Peter Witkin showcase
human anomalies, amputated body parts, dead ani-
mals, and cadavers composed in a manner highly
consistent with traditional artistic formulas, espe-
cially the fifteenth and sixteenth century Dutch still-
life tradition ofvanitaspaintings—collections of
objects that symbolize the brevity of human life
(also known asmemento moriand to some extent,
Surrealism of the 1930s. Since it was first exhibited
in the early 1980s, Witkin’s work has been the
subject of controversy and debate, with some de-
nouncing the work as sensational or exploitative.
Witkin’s photographs have also received recogni-
tion in exhibitions worldwide, as well as critical
acclaim from organizations such as the National
Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the New
York State Council on the Arts, which have recog-
nized his work as unique and worthy of support.
The son of an Orthodox Jewish father and Catho-
lic mother, Joel-Peter Witkin was born in Brooklyn,
New York, in 1939. Both Jewish mysticism and
strict Catholic doctrine proved highly influential
on him from an early age. He combined his fascina-
tion for religion with a penchant for photography
after acquiring his first camera in 1955. (One of
Witkin’s earliest subjects was a rabbi who claimedWITKIN, JOEL-PETER