Etchings by Joseph Gielniak

Joseph Gielniak was born in a family of Polish immigrants in France, where he finished high school and studied for a year at the famous Ecole des Beaux Arts in Vallenciennes. He went to Poland in 1950 with the intention of studying at the Department of Consular and Diplomatic in Warsaw. This plan was canceled due to a severe case of lung disease. At the age of 21 Joseph Gielniak was sent to a sanatorium in Bukowiec near Kowary in Lower Silesia, where he spent almost his entire adult life. The architectural elements and the environment of the sanatorium were frequent motifs in his art.