Pastel pageant at National Museum in Warsaw

'Masters of Pastel: From Marteau to Witkacy', which opens on Thursday, draws entirely on the collection of the National Museum itself.

Among the 250 works of art on display are pastels by such celebrated Polish artists as Stanisław Wyspiański, Olga Boznańska, Leon Wyczółkowski, Władysław Ślewiński and Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz (aka Witkacy).

The exhibition is arranged chronologically, beginning with Louis Francois Marteau (1715-1804), one of the artists at the court of Poland's last monarch, King Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski (r. 1764 -1795).

In the case of Wyspiański (1869-1907), a multi-talented artist who also wrote plays and designed stained glass and furniture, the use of pastels became a necessity as he developed an allergy to oil paint. His pastel portraits endure among the most prized works in Polish collections.

Like Wyspiański, Witkacy (1885-1939) was a man with many strings to his bow (painter, playwright and photographer), yet his often lurid pastels count among his most intriguing works.

He frequently painted them under the influence of substances such as cocaine and peyote, although his originality and vision were abundantly clear well before his experimentations with such drugs.

Three portraits by Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz (Witkacy). Photo: PAP/ Radek Pietruszka

'Masters of Pastel: From Marteau to Witkacy' runs until 31 January 2016. (nh/rk)