"It took us a year of talks and negotiations to finalise the project to exhibit 40 works from our collection at a location as unique as Książ Castle in July," says Piotr Oszczanowski, PhD, Head of the National Museum in Wroclaw. "Many a painting must have seen Princess Daisy roaming the corridors of the castle".
On Wednesday 8 April, the exhibition agreement was signed by Piotr Oszczanowski, PhD, Head of the National Museum, and Krzysztof Urbański, President of the Board of Trustees at Książ Castle. The exhibition is going to feature 38 paintings and 2 sculptures from the collection of the National Museum in Wroclaw. The collection on display is also going to include 10 paintings from the Hochberg collection, 4 baroque portraits of various members of the family and other works selected to decorate the castle interiors.
"For more than 700 years, Książ Castle has been a living part of the Arcadian setting of Lower Silesia," says Beata Lejman, PhD, the curator of the "Książ Castle Metamorphoses" exhibition. "This is unique, since the castle remembers numerous horrors and ravages of war. The architectural complex has survived largely due to the reconstruction it underwent in the 18th century. Maximilian von Hochberg dressed the fortress, which was built by the Świdnica-Jawor line of the Piast family, in a baroque-style attire. The said attire has survived until today".
The exhibition is also going to feature a scene from Ovid's "Metamorphoses" representing Pan as he chases the nymph Syrinx and a cycle of paintings by Stephan Kessler depicting the biblical parable of the prodigal son. The paintings will be presented at the Exhibition Hall, at drawing rooms on the first floor and at the Konrad Hall, which is the most ancient section of the castle.
"This is a unique enterprise," says Krzysztof Urbański, President of the Board of Trustees at Książ Castle. "I must also add that it's only the first stage in our collaboration. We have a lot of plans to foster collaboration with the National Museum in the future".
The preparations for the exhibition have continued for months now, since suitable conditions had to be created to exhibit such precious works of art, including both restoration and safety. The exhibition will be open to the public from 11 July 2015 to 8 July 2019.
