Polish Painting. By Henryk Gotlib. (Minerva Publishing Co. 255.) THIS
handsomely-produced book, which has over a hundred and fifty reproductions, deals with Polish painting from the Middle Ages to the present day. It is written by one of the most interesting of contemporary Polish painters, who recently held an exhibition in London. " It appears," he says, " that a pertain originality of Polish painting is due to the fact that some of the traits to be found in it are the result of an accumulation of influences which cannot be traced solely to the styles familiar in Western Europe." The originality of Polish painting could easily be overstressed, and Mr. R H. Wilenski, in a wise preface, points out that the travelled, power-holding Polish classes have been the main patrons of the work here illustrated—for popular prints and handicrafts are not shown: and the commissioning members of these classes, like their prototypes in any other country, have always demanded an art with a popular flavour. The illustrations do indeed reveal the work of a few artists from all ages of remarkable talent and a few with a strongly natior al flavour—notably, from the past, Michalowski with his studies of horses and Rodakowski with his portraits, and among contemporaries or near-contemporaries, Stanislaw Wyspianski and some others ; but the most remarkable thing about such a bulk of work from one country is that it should show so little national accent.
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