Fluffy rabbits, colourful birds, a realistic portrait of an Eskimo. Delicate, cloying, serene - they make up an extraordinary collection of porcelain works. Cybis Porcelain Art Studio is a place that was created to give space for experimentation to two Polish artists. They were financially supported and made famous by the products created at the Cordey China Company. Although the energy died with the death of the owners, the products of Maria and Bolesław Cybis' company still find their buyers.

Bolesław and Maria Cybis - biography
Bolesław Cybis was born in Massandra near Yalta in Crimea (1895) and died in the United States of America in Trenton (1957). He was a painter, sculptor, draughtsman, graphic artist, designer and maker of theatre scenery. He graduated from the Real School in Kharkov (1915) and took up art studies at the School of Fine Arts there. After the Bolshevik Revolution and the civil war, he fled from Ukraine to Istanbul (1920). He remained in Turkey for several years, imitating various occupations, including painting shop signs and making theatre sets.

In Warsaw, Cybis studied at the School of Fine Arts (1923-1926). Here he met his teacher, mentor and friend Tadeusz Pruszkowski. He also almost naturally joined the Brotherhood of St. Luke, a group founded by the artist's students. A few years later, Bolesław Cybis completed his artistic studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw (1933-1934), where he was later a lecturer in drawing. As Irena Kossowska recalls, in his Warsaw activities he noted his apprenticeship at the local ceramics factory of Andrzej Wojnacki and Kazimierz Czechowski.

Probably during his studies he met his future wife Maria Tym, whom he married (1925 or 1926). It is said that they lived together in one of the spans of the Poniatowski Bridge.

In art, he was fascinated by painting and sculpture. In addition to several well-known paintings, such as the painting 'Chinka' (ca. 1928, oil/board, own technique), 'Sailor, Woman and Child' (1920-1922, watercolour, ink, gouache/paper) or 'Figure of a Woman in a Yellow Beret' (1932-1935, oil/canvas), Bolesław Cybis was involved in monumental works. In the edifice of the Military Geographical Institute in Warsaw, together with Jan Zamoyski, he created a fresco entitled "Bolesław Chrobry wytyczający granice Polski na Odrze" ("Bolesław Chrobry Delineating the Polish Borders on the Oder River") (1934-1937), he was also the author of the painting "Abundance", placed in the plafond of the Polish pavilion at the World Exhibition "Art and Technology" in Paris (1937). A year earlier, he had designed and made decorations for the bar on the ship m/s Batory.

Maria Cybis née Tym (1906-1958) was a student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw (probably in the years 1924-1926). Together with her husband, she co-created the frescoes and sculptures attributed to him. She was credited with the authorship of three and co-authorship of more than twenty stone sculptures and decorations, which the Cybises placed in their Warsaw backyard garden (now in the collection of the Królikarnia, a branch of the National Museum in Warsaw). She was also mentioned in the teams creating frescoes for Polish pavilions at world exhibitions, including the New York one. She was the author of the techniques used in the creation of porcelain works, co-creator and co-owner of the American companies the couple founded, and creator of many porcelain designs and works bearing the "Cybis" name. She died in the United States in Trenton.

Cybis frescoes in New York at the World Exhibition
Maria and Bolesław Cybis travelled to New York in the spring of 1939, commissioned by the Polish government, for whom they were preparing frescoes to decorate the Polish pavilion at the World Exhibition. Among the works attributed to the Cybises were the frescoes 'Poles Fighting for American Independence' and 'Central Industrial District and Gdynia'. Bolesław Cybis was also the co-author of a series of seven paintings created by the Brothers of the Brotherhood of St. Luke (including: "Bolesław Chrobry greeting Otto III on his pilgrimage to the tomb of St. Adalbert in Gniezno"; "Baptism of Lithuania"; "Union of Lublin"; "Odsiecz Wiednia"; "Constitution of 3 May"). The paintings were created in Tadeusz Pruszkowski's villa in Kazimierz Dolny and were transported with other objects to the United States. Currently, the works of the Lukas are in the collection of Le Moyne College in Syracuse, where they have been deposited due to the war in Europe at the time.

Cybis porcelain manufactories in the USA
The outbreak of the Second World War blocked the Cybises from returning to Poland. They therefore remained in New York and tied their lives forever to the United States. They took up creating porcelain. They set up their first studio in Astoria, in the Queens borough of New York. Once the scale of production was huge, they moved the company to Trenton, New Jersey. The factory for the mass production of the Cybises' designs was called Cordey China Inc.

. Nevertheless, the couple did not give up their artistic ambitions and set up an experimental studio called Cybis Porcelain Art. The company's labels featured colourful and cute animals (rabbits, birds, horses), romantic angels and princesses, but also naturalistically rendered portraits of Eskimos or Indians. The company also produced lamp bases.

Cybis - synonymous with fine porcelain
In a special article published in The New York Times (1975), Michael Goodwin stated that the name Bolesław Cybis is "synonymous with fine porcelain". To this day, the artists' works still appear at professional auctions and in the offerings of internet portals selling various things. Works of art from the hand of Maria and Bolesław Cybis are sought after by collectors, lovers of fine trinkets and museum collection managers. Porcelain works signed with the name of the Polish artists can be found in many parts of the world, including more than 80 collections in the United States and Europe.

Shortly before their deaths, the Cybis family sold their thriving company, which continued production - especially lamp bases. The production of artistic porcelain and the designs created by the Cybis Porcelain Art studio were taken over by one of their employees.

The aforementioned New Yorker article cited the story of one of the largest commissions in the company's history, which was related to President Richard Nixon's planned visit to Soviet Russia (1972). The US administration was looking for a suitable gift for Leonid Brezhnev. The White House contacted the Trenton manufactory. "After lengthy discussions, the two sides agreed that the ideal gift would be a chess set, given the Russians' love of the game," the journal states. Works produced by the Cybis companies have also been given as gifts to Queen Elizabeth, the Shah of Iran and the President of Mexico. A website telling the story of the Cybis company and the porcelain wonders it produced can now be found online.

Although Maria Cybis is overlooked in studies, Bolesław Cybis has found a place in art history. Several years ago, the National Museum in Warsaw organised a monographic exhibition of the artist, "Bolesław Cybis 1895-1957. Painting, drawing, sculpture. Creativity of the 1920s and 1930s" (National Museum in Warsaw, 20 September - 3 November 2002).

1942-1958

Bolesław Cybis (malarz, grafik, rzeźbiarz, ceramik; Polska, USA)(aperçu), Maria Cybis (malarka, rzeźbiarka; Polska, USA)(aperçu)

Anna Rudek-Śmiechowska