Through a Glass Lushly: Michalina Janoszanka's Reverse Paintings (Ca. 1920s)

Viewed side by side, the artists’ respective experiments in glass painting could not have been more different. But in Maine, New Mexico, and Kraków, reverse painting presented new possibilities to a generation of modernist artists. There is no telling whether Janoszanka was aware of these other experimenters in avant-garde glass painting. It is also unclear if she faced the same gendered critique: the critic Paul Rosenfeld, argues Wurzelbacher, “cast Hartley’s ‘canvases and rectangles of glass’ as effeminate”, comparing them to “some sweet bit of handiwork . . . the design of a sampler, a piece of embroidery.” Though her name remains overshadowed by Malczewski, Janoszanka’s work presents a compelling case for reassessment. Her dreamlike glass paintings are a bridge between folk tradition and modernist experimentation. They raise unanswered questions not just about Janoszanka’s career, but also about modernism’s engagement with glass painting across cultural boundaries. Questions that c ... Read full article.