Signed p. d.: E. Markowski ;
On the reverse, on the painter's loom, author's inscription: " Moralitet x2".
Eugeniusz Markowski's paintings are associated with the trend of new figuration due to the uninhibited, "wild" form of artistic expression. The artist depicts simplified, zoomorphic figures using intense, pure colors that give expressive expression to often hieratic compositions that barely fit within the canvas. In the artist's works one can look for archetypes and symbolic or moralizing-critical overtones, at the same time generalized to the primal needs or characteristics of the human race. Some of Markovsky's compositions are accompanied by literary quotations included in the margins of the paintings, providing a commentary on what the artist has depicted.
A painter, he graduated from the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts in 1938, but initially devoted himself to a career as a diplomat and journalist. He returned to Poland in 1955 and only then began to paint. Eugeniusz Markowski created series of paintings with analogous titles but different numbers. He repeatedly elaborated on the theme that troubled him. The presented canvas - "Moralitet" probably dates from the 1970s and is one of several similar compositions. Most of these works were not accompanied by fragments of text, which probably inspired or summarized the theme currently bothering the painter. The exception is a painting presented in 2003, during an exhibition at a Warsaw gallery, dated 1960, where the author's commentary appeared: "J. Cocteau. (Warsaw 1960) - said at a reception at the French ambassador's house: the Poles, like the French, give preference to heart over reason. The Poles recreated not the face, but the heart of Warsaw, and therefore rebuilt both what was beautiful in it and what was ugly."
