A Scene in a Park

Born in Krakow Gotlib studied at the Krakow Academy of Fine Art and then in Vienna, Munich and Paris before the First World War. He became the leader of the Polish avant-garde 'Formist' movement, exhibiting in Berlin, Amsterdam and Paris, and was an influential writer and teacher in Poland. In 1939 he was forced into exile and settled in Britain, exhibiting with the London Group. His work, principally in figure painting, represents an important element in the development of British painting and sculpture: the assimilation of European trends and the invigoration of British art following the diaspora in Central Europe under Communism and Nazism. This work is one of 600 early works left by the artist in the attic of his Krakow studio before 1932, they were found by Hanna Cybis and given to the artist's widow in Mrs Janet Gotlib. His drawings show how nature and the world around him influenced his work. His studies appear like notes done in nature or efforts to show how his own way of seeing. This drawing appears to have been torn out of a notebook.