In Ignacy Drexler's article 'The Work of Jan Henryk Rosen', published in the journal Świat, 1927, no. 42, p. 5 (public domain, reprinted after the KUL University Library), Jan Henryk Rosen's mural paintings made for the Armenian Cathedral in Lviv in 1925-1927 were described. More were created in 1928-1929.

A modernised reading of the text

The work of Jan Henryk Rosen.

Guests from all over Poland, who have come to take part in the ecclesiastical and national jubilee celebration of His Eminence Archbishop Jozef Teodorowicz, are welcomed by the ancient Armenian Basilica, which still remembers the 14th century, with a new, hitherto unseen appearance. The most ancient part of the church, in the layout of a complete small central temple, with forms related to the hieratic Armenian buildings in Asia Minor, has shed its plasterwork, mediocre paintings, graceful altars not harmonising with the original surroundings, and stood in its pure, old, rich form, unique in the whole of Central Europe.

The intricate cascading and ornamentation of the pillars, the characteristic cornices and the touching votive crosses, engraved on marble plaques or directly on the stone walls and pillars of the basilica, the fortunately preserved, very interesting, Byzantine-style paintings from the 15th century. - These are a number of elements that the Archbishop boldly tore away from oblivion, into which they were thrown by a ruthless and brutal restoration in the age of the all-modernising Rococo. This happily restored, now presbyterial part of the church is crowned with a central dome, which is overlaid with beautiful mosaics by Mehoffer ("Holy Trinity").

The overall design is highly original, harmonious and full of poignancy. The adjoining central nave, not at all spacious and with rather common forms, dates from the 17th century. Covered before the war itself with an arched wooden ceiling by arch. It was covered before the war with an arched wooden ceiling by arch architect Mączyński, showing forms and colours that were quite risky, and did not raise any great artistic hopes. However, as a result of a fortunate choice of painter, to whom the Archbishop entrusted the decoration of the cathedral's walls, an interior was created which, without exaggeration, can be said to have no equal in Poland in terms of beauty, and which can boldly be compared with the most valuable wall paintings of the 19th and 20th centuries abroad.

Jan Henryk Rosen, son of the famous battle scene painter of 1831, is the artist to whom Lviv, the city with the richest cultural heritage in the Republic next to Krakow, owes one of its highest spiritual treasures: the polychrome of the Armenian Cathedral. The side walls of the aforementioned nave are divided by three window openings and two pairs of pilasters into small, partly asymmetrical areas, generally insufficiently illuminated and seemingly inconvenient for the favourable placement of paintings.

In spite of all this, today, after the paintings have been finished, the whole looks as natural as if the architectural layout had been deliberately made centuries ago to accommodate these compositions. Even the ceiling with its gilded pilasters has been drawn into the harmony of the ensemble. The paintings fit above each other in three tiers. The right wall features multi-person scenes based on motifs taken from the history before the Nativity of Christ: the parable of the tree to be thrown into the fire, the vision of Isaiah, the sacrifice of Isaac, St John the Baptist, the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The left wall is occupied by figures of the Lord's saints of the first centuries of Christianity: St Catherine of Alexandria, carried by angels, St Idzi, defending animals from hunters, and a number of saints, alone either in individual fields or in groups: St George, St Christopher, St Blaise, St Dionysius, St Barbara, St Margaret, and above all a composition that captivates the viewer: "Funeral of St Odillon". The whole mood is complemented by the wonderfully harmonised topaz stained glass windows. This dry enumeration of themes does not yet say anything about the work's intrinsic value.

It is necessary to come and absorb with one's own eyes the richness and extraordinary delicacy of the scenes, movements and gestures, to analyse the absolute mastery of the drawings and forms, to succumb to the delight of the colours and shades, the glitter of the golden robes and pilasters, the gleam of the silver armours and the stars in the black firmament, to admire the extraordinary fantasy of the ideas and moods, the rare originality of each painting, and above all to open one's heart wide to the supreme value of Jan Henryk Rosen's works: to the unsurpassable spiritual atmosphere that strangely radiates from his immortal works.

This is neither the time nor the place for a description and analysis of the individual paintings, nor for a detailed evaluation of all these masterpieces. Today, I only herald a great joy for Poland: a work of great talent has been born, a diamond of the purest inspiration has crystallised, a new great pride of the Fatherland.

Crowds will soon be making pilgrimages to the Armenian Basilica, just as they gather in the Paris Panthéon to contemplate the story of the life of St. Genevieve in the powerful frescoes by Puvis de Chavannes, that great artist to whom J. H. Rosen resembles not only in the unsurpassed mood of his works, but also in his relatively late but unexpectedly blossoming vocation as a painter.