Problem identyfikacji tzw. stylu około 1800 roku w twórczości Rogera Sławskiego

Abstract

The Problem of Identification of the Style of around the Year 1800 in Roger Slawski’s Output

The output of Roger Sławski, recognized as a distinguished architect of the first half of the 20th century, working in Poznań and in the Greater Poland region, is placed among numerous trends which appeared in European architecture at the beginning of the 20th century. Since these forms originated from a classicizing Baroque and are especially clearly pronounced in landowners’ residences, some Polish architects, including Sławski, are regarded as the authors of the so-called “national style”. This has resulted in many myths and misinterpretations. The problem calls for an explanation because the source of the misunderstanding lies in an intentional social response to those forms, associated with the reality of before the partitions of Poland, rather than in a costume of style. In Prussia, classicizing Baroque, defined as a style of around the year 1800, became in the beginning of the 20th century the style of large and small residential buildings, railway stations, some public buildings as a response to neo-Gothic, or lack of taste, identified with eclecticism. The elegant and quiet neo-Baroque forms raised enthusiasm in and were propagated primarily by Friedrich Ostendorf, connected earlier with the Technische Hochschule in Berlin and later on with the university in Karlsruhe. At the same time, the same source inspired Roger Sławski. It seems interesting to confront the outputs of Prussian and Polish architects, drawing inspiration from the same forms of classicizing Baroque. Although formal differences in those forms are not dominant, the major differences among them lie in their interpretation. Political entanglements hid from view the similarities between them that originated from their common source of inspiration: the classicizing Baroque, the architecture of Karlsruhe, and the same technical university.