In the years 1947–1949 he attended the School of Fine Arts in Kraków (together with Roman Cieślewicz and Franciszek Starowieyski). In 1950, he began to study painting at the Academy of Fine Arts with Professor Adam Marczyński (graduating in 1955). At the same time he studied art history at the Jagiellonian University, obtaining a Master’s Degree in 1954.
Józef Wilkoń is one of the greatest Polish artists in the field of illustration. He has contributed to nearly two hundred books for both children and adults. Works illustrated by him have been translated into more than 20 languages. He has collaborated with Nasza Księgarnia, Czytelnik, Wydawnictwo Literackie, the National Publishing Agency, Flammarion (Paris), Middelhauve Verlag (Cologne), Loewes Verlag (Bayreuth), Kinderbuchverlag (Berlin), Parabel Verlag (Munich), Atlantis Verlag (Zurich), the Greek Peace Publishers (Tokyo), and others.
In 1956, Wilkoń moved from Kraków to Warsaw. After completing his first illustration projects, he planned to return to easel painting, but it soon turned out that he was to work in illustration for good.
The artist most often portrays animals and nature in fast and decisive brush strokes. His illustrations are realistic, they do not embellish nor idealise nature. Wilkoń is rarely interested in humans, but the psychological portraits of animals created by him are essentially portraits of people. Using animals as metaphors, much can be said about people. However, Wilkoń warns about one important principle:
I never use animal characters in accordance with La Fontaine’s tradition. I never use them to represent a particular human quality, especially a negative one.
Wilkoń is primarily inspired by nature: the atmosphere remembered from his childhood spent in the mountainous village of Bogucice, scenic landscapes and the mysterious world of animals, among which he grew up. The artist manages to give universal form to these fascinations and personal passions. Wilkoń highly values artists who introduce poetic elements into their work, such as Marc Chagall, but he also feels a certain affinity with the exotic art of the Far East.
Wilkoń's Ark, Zachęta National Gallery of Art, 2006/2007, view of the exhibition, photo Sebastian Madejski, photo courtesy of Zachęta National Gallery of Art The artist willingly experiments with different painting techniques, although he typically uses ink, watercolour and dry pastels. His works can be divided into several periods: the years 1957–1963 were marked by experiments with liquid, 1962–1970 – experiments with texture, 1978–1994 – pastels, and finally, 1991–1994 – 3D images and sculptures.
The first book illustrated by Jóżef Wilkoń – About a Cat Which was Looking for Black Milk by Helena Bechlerowa – was published in 1959. In the same year Nasza Księgarnia issued the Peacock Poems by Tadeusz Kubiak, inspired by peacock drawings that Wilkoń, fascinated by the beauty of these birds, made during a holiday in Łańcut. In 1960, the artist’s first solo exhibition took place in the Polish Artists Union Gallery in Warsaw. The display included illustrations which had been awarded the IBA gold medal in Leipzig. In 1963, Wilkoń created a series of illustrations for Pan Tadeusz by Adam Mickiewicz, in which the dominant theme was nature and the landscape. The artist did not recreate the content of the work, but illustrated the romantic landscape of the poet’s childhood. The pages of Pan Tadeusz were filled with big trees and exuberant vegetation, in which people and animals almost find their deaths. This work has resulted in numerous awards for Wilkoń and closed a period of experimentation with watercolour techniques.
Wilkoń's Ark, Zachęta National Gallery of Art, 2006/2007, view of the exhibition, photo Sebastian Madejski, photo courtesy of Zachęta National Gallery of Art Later, the artist had a period of fascination with texture. Illustrations were created with opaque paints (for example acrylic) on unusual materials such as cardboard, wrapping paper with uneven, ragged edges, or astralon (a kind of transparent celluloid). During this time Wilkoń also started using a golden colour reminiscent of the traditions of iconography or Persian miniature painting.
In the 1950s, when it was very hard to find paper in Poland, I discovered that grocery stores had sugar bags. They were filled with 50 kilos of sugar, which was not packed but sold by weight. And this paper had an amazing texture. At times the drawings looked like tapestries because the texture of the paper and the brush strokes created a weave effect.
– said the artist.
A number of illustrations were created using this technique, including those for Seven Moons by Wanda Chotomska (1970), Martin from under the Wild Apple by Eleanor Farjeon (1966), Maciupinki by Jerzy Ficowski (1968) and In Not Paris and Elsewhere by Anna Kamieńska (1967).
In the following years Wilkoń enjoyed painting with dry pastels. This technique allowed him to represent different materials with high precision, for example, animal fur. Wild and domestic cats became frequent characters of his works; he even used them to depict the history of the French Revolution (Trampled Cat, 1992).
From the very beginning, the written word acted as a canvas for Wilkoń, on which he created parallel, imaginary worlds – very autonomous, and yet harmoniously linked to the text.
Wilkoń never treated illustration as ancillary or subordinate to the written narrative, but as its artistic development or addition.
Text and illustration should be complementary so that tension in the book grows in the same way as in the theatre
– he explained.
In the 1980s Wilkoń stopped working with Polish publishing houses as a protest against martial law and the political situation in the country. However, he worked extensively with foreign publishers on more than 70 projects.
