In his paintings, illustrative qualities dominated over muted, pastel colours. Forms were evoked through subtle, light and shadow modelling, and broad gradations of colour tones complemented by descriptive contours and lines (W Pracowni / In the Studio, 1932). This aesthetic style corresponded to the mood of the scenes he visualised and harmoniously inscribed into idyllic landscapes, seeking to express the unity of man with nature (W Lesie: Młodość / In the Forest: Youth, 1932). His images often contained references to mythology or constituted allegories of the seasons of the year or stages of human life (Diana, 1929).
Frequent motifs in Borowski’s paintings included lovers feasting in Rococo gardens, shepherds and harvesters, pickers joyous at the abundance of fruit, thoughtful circus artists and acrobats, pilgrims and Goliards lost in empty city lanes, musicians enraptured by the sounds of their instruments. Subtle geometrical forms, contained in parallel folds of clothing, simplified architectural forms, and foliage treated approximately, combined to create compositional discipline in both sprawling figural scenes and in modest still lifes (Martwa Natura z Draperia / Still Life with Drapery, 1930).
While a member of the Rhythm Association, Borowski enjoyed a friendship and artistic relationship with Eugeniusz Zak. The artists drew on similar motifs to create scenes in an idyllic mood, and stylised their forms to resemble the work of Quattrocento masters, subordinating them to an all-encompassing structure of rhythms. In the early 1930s, Borowski shifted to intensified colours, brightened his palette, and enriched the texture of his oil paintings sometimes differentiating his surfaces with the help of a spatula and knife.
In addition to painting canvasses, the artist also created monumental paintings. His works in polychrome included the chapel of the Kościeliski family in Miloslav in the region of Great Poland (1914), the Royal Palace in Warsaw (Thursday Dinner Room, 1925), the interior of the Ziemiańska Café on Mazowiecka Street in Warsaw (decorative panel, 1927), four townhouses in Old Town Square (1928), the Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (National Economy Bank) (murals over doors), the Prudential Building (decorative panel), and the interiors of the ocean liners M/s Piłsudski and M/s Batory (1934-35). In 1929 Borowski decorated the Art Pavilion at the National Exposition in Poznań with a series of allegorical murals. He also designed posters, created single and multi-coloured lithographs, and illustrated books, among them Juliusz Slowacki’s Anhelli (1929) and Żywe Kamienie / Living Stones by Wacław Berent (1933). Borowski contributed illustrations to periodicals, including Skamander and Wiadomosci Literackie (Literary News). A series of the artist’s pastel drawings illustrating Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey date from the time of World War II. Borowski created scenery designs for theatres in Warsaw, Poznań, Wrocław, Lódź, and Czestochowa, working especially closely with Warsaw’s Polish Theatre (Teatr Polski) for a series of years. After the war, Borowski also designed currency notes for the State Securities Company in Lódź.
Author: Irena Kossowska, Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Science, December 2001.