MNK Mehoffer

The Józef Mehoffer House is a museum-artist’s home, in this case featuring a rich collection of authentic furnishings. The painter’s grandson, Ryszard MNK Mehoffer (1922–2010), donated – or placed on loan – numerous items from the house’s former furnishings for this purpose: a wealth of antique furniture, works of artistic craftsmanship, a library, a collection of Japanese woodblock prints, sculptures, photographs, family mementoes and, above all, works by Józef Mehoffer: oil paintings, drawings, prints, decorative designs and stained-glass windows.

From the outset, selected items from the Museum’s own collection were also included in the exhibition. The selection of the artist’s works is, in any case, subject to certain changes, including for conservation reasons. It is also enhanced by loans from other sources.

The layout of the exhibition draws on the artist’s own vision, in which he designated the ground floor on the south side for reception and leisure purposes (a large dining room, a library, and a drawing room opening onto the terrace and garden), whilst on the first floor he arranged more intimate rooms.

The former appearance of these interiors has been reconstructed on the basis of iconography, written documents and family memoirs. Their character had largely been shaped earlier in the successive arrangements of Jadwiga and Józef Mehoffer’s previous homes, which were filled with the same stylish furniture, family heirlooms and other valuable furnishings, as well as, of course, the artist’s works. The house on Krupnicza Street combined the character of a traditional Polish home with historical elements applied in a conscious and artistic manner, as well as with a certain touch of 1930s aesthetics. Its individual character was always owed to the rich collection of Mehoffer’s works. The museum exhibition reflects this distinctive nature.

Even in the entrance hall, one can spot certain distinctive and original touches, such as old lamps, the original design of the grilles, and the stone portal. In turn, the bright, impressively arranged staircase with wooden steps and a fine wooden balustrade is adorned with numerous, ingeniously incorporated elements of Baroque woodcarving and copies of stone keystones from Wawel Cathedral, as well as features designed specifically for this interior: the skylight coffers and the casing for the coke stove, resembling a decorative fireplace.

Nearby, above the doors to the drawing room and dining room, there are cartouches bearing the Mehoffer and Janakowski coats of arms, as well as portraits of ancestors. The effect is completed by the colourful, large-format designs by Józef Mehoffer placed on the walls above the stairs. The rooms, arranged according to their designated functions, also serve as a special gallery of works by Mehoffer from various periods, ranging from his youth, through the magnificent era of Young Poland, to the interwar and occupation periods, when the now elderly painter lived and worked here.

Text by: Anna Zeńczak – art historian, retired curator of the National Museum in Kraków. She specialises in art from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Author of studies on the work of Józef Mehoffer.