Description:
Ludomir Janowski (1862-1939) began his studies at Ivan Trutnev’s Drawing School in Vilnius, then as a free listener he attended the St. Petersburg Academy. After graduating, he lived in Vilnius, and in 1906 he settled in Warsaw. Over the years, he presented his works at exhibitions at home and abroad. The influence of Józef Pankiewicz, with whom he was friends, is visible in his works. In his work he mainly dealt with portrait and landscape painting.

Description of the painting:
The painting depicts a woman in a bust portrait, en face (straight ahead). The model’s arms are schematically shown. The head is surrounded by thick hair, divided by a part in the middle, forming a kind of frame for the bright face. The features are sharpened by the applied light shade. The artist marked the shape of the cheekbones or folds in the corners of the mouth. By emphasizing the light on the tip of the nose, the artist gave it almost three-dimensional effect. The eyes are deeply set and the woman looks straight at the viewer. The background is uniform, kept in a dark color scheme.

The work is monochromatic, kept in shades of black and gray. To capture the details, the artist used a strong light shade, which gives realism to the portrait. Limiting the representation of the woman’s arms to show their outline makes the work a study of the head. The artist presents the face in great detail, but also the woman’s hair showing their strands brightened by a spot of light coming from behind the upper edge of the painting.