Karol Tichy

Tichy before 1923

Karol Józef Tichy (2 February 1871 - 26 or 27 November 1939) was a Polish Art Nouveau painter, designer and lecturer.

Biography

He was born in Bursztyn, then in the Austrian Empire and now in Ukraine. After leaving secondary school, he began studying law at the Jagiellonian University (1889-1890) and painting at the School of Fine Arts, both in Krakow. He continued studying art in Munich and at the École des beaux-arts in Paris.

He was mainly involved in applied arts, designing interiors, fabrics, furniture and ceramics (making him one of the pioneers of modern artistic ceramics in Poland). He co-founded the artists' cooperative Ład in 1926 and was a member of the Polska Sztuka Stosowana (Polish Applied Art) (1901–1914).

From 1904 onwards he was a lecturer at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, where he ran a painting and ceramic studio, and was the Academy's director from 1922 to 1923. He died in Warsaw and was buried at Niepołomice.

Decorations

• Order of Polonia Restituta:
  • Officer's Cross, 2 May 1924
  • Commander's Cross, "for merits in the field of development of art", 11 November 1936

Gallery

• 
  Funeral, oil on canvas, c. 1900
• 
  Rug, c. 1900
• 
  Portrait of the Artist's Mother, c. 1900
• 
  Portrait of Feliks Jasieński, c. 1901
• 
  Armchair from a bedroom suite, 1909, National Museum, Warsaw
• 
  Dressing table from a bedroom suite, 1909, National Museum, Warsaw
• 
  His house in Krakow, designed by him in 1912

Bibliography

• (in Polish) M. Wallis: Secesja. Wydanie II. Wydawnictwo Arkady, Warszawa 1974.
• (in Polish) Wielka Encyklopedia Powszechna PWN, tom 11, s. 524, Warszawa 1968.