From the
moment of donation of Janez Počnik's folder of drawings to the National Gallery
of Slovenia they have represented a special challenge to researchers. Izidor
Cankar refuted the option of their creation in a school in Vienna, while it is
impossible to identify the quality of paper used and the ambitious format in
any other environment. We have managed to spot Potočnik's name among the
students of the Art Academy in Vienna in 1776. The dam-and deaf painter
survived at the academy only for a short time because he could not get
appropriate attention in following the curriculum. He spent a semester or two
copying after two dimensional model drawings and prints. Jakob Matthias
Schmutzer (1733−1811) prepared the majority of expressive heads for the
academic use.
Potočnik
drew from a model drawing that was still in use in 1844 when Paul Künl attended
the academy. We have recognized at least one in the portfolio at the National
Gallery by Künl's hand, dated 1844. Thus, we can get an insight into the
history of the portfolio. Drawings received by the National Gallery in 1922
were given to the painter Simon Ogrin by Alojz Valenta M. D. Valenta was a
gynaecologist, teacher at the school for midwives and the head of the Institute
and Museum of Anatomy opposite to the "Medja's house", where Janez
Wolf sent Ogrin to draw human skeleton. Ogrin donated to the National Gallery
Valenta's drawings, purchased at an antiquarian shop on Šentjakobsko nabrežje.
Valenta's widow gave second part of the collection to the Arts and Crafts
School in Ljubljana in 1923. They were united with the drawings at the National
Gallery after 1945. That second part, in which drawings after Schmuztzer's
expressive heads dominate, remained unknown to Izidor Cankar. The exhibition
enables us to reconstruct the education path of an artist with cognitive
limitations before introduction of standardized sign language and institutions
for the people with special needs existed.
13 December
2023–17 March 2024
National
Gallery of Slovenia
Prešernova 24
1000 Ljubljana