Adam Miedzyblocki Polish Watercolor Drawing The Great Synagogue of Vilna Signed

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Adam Miedzyblocki Polish Watercolor Drawing The Great Synagogue of Vilna Signed:
$999.00

Adam Miedzyblocki
Polish Artist
Watercolor Drawing on paper
The Great Synagogue of Vilna (destroyed) with figures of jews
Signed 1920s
Size: 23.8 x 16.8 cm. (9.3 x 6.6”)
Signed lower right and stamp of his studio on reverse side
Condition – see carefully photos
Light scratches, small tear to the right edge : ca. 5 mm.
Brown paper to reverse side.
The Great Synagogue of Vilna, which once stood at the end of Jewish Street (I-2), Vilnius, Lithuania, was built between 1630 and 1633 after permission was granted to construct a synagogue from stone. Standing on the spot of an existing synagogue built in 1572, the site had first been used to house a Jewish house of prayer in 1440.
According to legend it was so magnificent and impressive, Napoleon who stood on the threshold of this synagogue in 1812 and gazed at the interior was speechless with admiration. The synagogue had a number of entrances. One, at street level, consisted of a pair of iron gates that had been donated by a tailors\' society in 1640. The other entrance on the western side, added in 1800, was a bit more imposing: it had an elevated two-tiered wooden gable with a portal and wrought iron posts. There was a heavy iron door with an original Hebrew inscription indicating it was a gift of a \"society of Psalm reciters\" in 1642. At the time of its building, ecclesiastical regulations all through Europe specified that a synagogue could not be built higher than a church. To obey the law, and yet create the necessary interior height, it was customary to dig a foundation deep enough for the synagogue’s floor level to be well below that of the street. Outside, the synagogue looked to be about three stories tall, but inside it soared to over five stories. Another entrance with a vestibule and the \"pillory\" was located on the northern side of the building.
The interior of the synagogue was redesigned in the mid-18th century by Vilnian German Johann Christoph Glaubitz. It had the overwhelming grandeur of an edifice in the style of the Italian Renaissance and an awe-inspiring atmosphere. Four massive, equidistant columns supported the vast stone-floored pile, and within them was the three-tiered ornate, rococo bimah, with a beautiful cupola, supported by eight small columns. It was built in the second half of the eighteenth century by Rabbi Judah ben Eliezer (commonly known as the YeSoD – an acronym of the three words Yehudah Sofer ve-Dayyan), the famous scribe and judge.
The two-tiered Holy Ark on the Eastern wall was a splendid structure, intricately carved with gilded woodcarvings, representing plants, animals and Jewish symbols, with a double-headed eagle on top. It was approached by a twofold flight of steps, with iron balustrades, ascending from the right and the left. Hanging from the walls and ceilings there were numerous bronze and silver chandeliers. The synagogue contained a valuable collection of ritual objects. The building was repaired in the 19th century.
Formerly there was an imposing seven-branched brass candelabrum in front of the Ark, but on the eve of the German invasion of the city during World War I, it was sent off to Moscow. There also once was a \'Chair of Elijah\" in the northwest corner on which the rite of Brit milah was performed.
On both sides of the Holy Ark there were two-story structures, serving as the women\'s sections, connected to the prayer hall by little windows. Another gallery for women was situated along the north side, also consisting of two floors built by Noah Feibusch Bloch, a community elder who advanced the money and when the community was unable to return the 14,000 gulden due, he made a present of the structure.
The main prayer hall was square and could hold 300 people. The synagogue was designed on a substantial and massive scale, for it was also intended to serve as a stronghold within which the Jews could take refuge in times of danger. On the High Holy Days before World War II the synagogue held 5,000 worshippers.
In 1846, when Sir Moses Montefiore visited the synagogue, the treasurers distributed entrance tickets to the masses of people.
The synagogue was partly destroyed by the Soviets[1] during World War II. The ruined synagogue and the whole \"schulhof\" complex that had grown around it were demolished by the Soviet authorities from 1955 to 1957 and were intentionally replaced by a basketball court and a kindergarten to effectively prevent any future initiatives to rebuild a cultural monument. The kindergarten was later replaced by a primary school.
Three original pieces from the Great Synagogue of Vilna survived the destruction quite miraculously and are now on display at the Vilna Gaon Jewish Museum: a door of the Holy Ark, a reader’s desk, and a bas-relief with the Ten Commandments.
In 2011 Lithuanian PM Andrius Kubilius and Vilnius Mayor Arturas Zuokas announced plans to restore the synagogue, after successful archaeological exploration of synagogue ruins in the same year.[2] The Vilnius Great Synagogue memorial is planned to be finished around 2018.[3] In 2014 Israeli president Shimon Peres, who was introduced to the project during his official visit in Lithuania in 2013, was invited to join the board, together with Lithuania’s former President Valdas Adamkus, Lithuanian PM Algirdas Butkevicius and the prominent architect Daniel Liebeskind for the restoration project.[4] The project\'s Israeli architect, Tsila Zak, elaborated her original plans that had been already adopted by the municipal authorities of Vilnius in 1993, following an international competition in 1989-1990 in which she participated together with the Swedish sculpture Willy Gordon. The original location of the Great Synagogue was pinpointed by ground-penetrating radar in June 2015 beneath the modern school building, with excavations set to begin in 2016.
Adam Miedzyblocki (born 1883 in Gryszkance, died 1956 in Gdansk) - Polish painter.
Around 1899 he became a student of the Drawing School in Vilnius, and then he left for Krakow, where from 1908 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts. His professors were Teodor Axentowicz, Leon Wyczolkowski and Jozef Pankiewicz, he graduated in 1913 receiving a gold medal for outstanding achievements during his studies. After the outbreak of World War I, he left for Tbilisi, where he continued his education at the Academy of Fine Arts there. He traveled to Baku and Armenia. Around 1917 he left for Constantinople, where he also studied painting techniques. In 1919 he settled in Warsaw, a year later he volunteered to fight in the Polish-Bolshevik war. In 1922 he settled in Vilnius, where he created and professionally was a drawing teacher. He belonged to the Vilnius Society of Visual Artists and the Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts with which he exhibited his works. After the Second World War, he settled in Gdansk as part of the resettlement. Adam Miedzyblocki\'s works include watercolors of Vilnius, Warsaw, Krakow and Gdansk. He also painted portraits, whose manner of painting was modeled on the works of Teodor Axentowicz.Adam Miedzyblocki (ur. 1883 w Gryszkancach, zm. 1956 w Gdansku) – polski malarz.
Okolo 1899 zostal uczniem Szkoly Rysunku w Wilnie, a nastepnie wyjechal do Krakowa, gdzie od 1908 studiowal na Akademii Sztuk Pieknych. Jego profesorami byli Teodor Axentowicz, Leon Wyczolkowski i Jozef Pankiewicz, nauke ukonczyl w 1913 otrzymujac zloty medal za wybitne osiagniecia podczas studiow. Po wybuchu I wojny swiatowej wyjechal do Tbilisi, gdzie kontynuowal nauke w tamtejszej Akademii Sztuk Pieknych. Podrozowal do Baku i po Armenii. Okolo 1917 wyjechal do Konstantynopola, gdzie rowniez studiowal techniki malarskie. W 1919 zamieszkal w Warszawie, rok pozniej zglosil sie jako ochotnik do walki w wojnie polsko-bolszewickiej. W 1922 zamieszkal w Wilnie, gdzie tworzyl a zawodowo byl nauczycielem rysunku. Nalezal do Wilenskiego Towarzystwa Artystow Plastykow i do Towarzystwa Zachety Sztuk Pieknych z ktorymi wystawial swoje prace. Po II wojnie swiatowej w ramach przesiedlen zamieszkal w Gdansku. Tworczosc Adama Miedzyblockiego obejmuje akwarelowe weduty Wilna, Warszawy, Krakowa i Gdanska. Malowal rowniez portrety, ktorych sposob malowania byl wzorowany na tworczosci Teodora Axentowicza.