Juliusz Starzyński (1906 –1974)

Juliusz Starzynski (1906–1974) was an art historian as well as the director of three institutes of art; for almost forty years he held numerous academic and administrative positions and yet, today, he is almost unknown. He studied history of art at the University of Warsaw and simultaneously. After finishing his studies, he concentrated on his academic work, quickly advancing to higher levels. By the time war broke out, he had already been awarded a doctorate and was director of the Institute of Art Propaganda and curator at the National Museum in Warsaw, as well as lecturing in the Department of Architecture at the Polytechnic of Warsaw and at the National Institute of Theatrical Art. After the war started to work at the University of Warsaw and at the Ministry of Art and Culture. In 1949 he initiated the founding of the State Institute of Art, which was transformed in 1959 into the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Starzyński was director from 1949-1960 and again from 1968-1974. During the Stalin years, he was a supporter of socrealism, but as soon as political pressure began to wane, he abandoned this perspective. Internationally, he was very active as a member and deputy chairperson of AICA. He organised exhibitions of Polish art abroad, among other places, at Art Biennale in Venice. After being dismissed from the position of director of the IS PAN as a result of political conflict with the management, he continued to work there, living in France on scholarships, giving lectures there about correspondance des arts during the Romantic Period, and publishing three books on the subject, two in Polish and one in French. From 1950-1970 he was the director of the Institute of the Art History at the University of Warsaw, where he regularly lectured.