Piotr Cholewka: Known and Unknown

Abstract

Father Piotr Cholewka was born in 1922 in a Silesian village of Marciszow near Zawiercie. In 1925, his family emigrated to Barlin in northern France. In 1943 he entered the Benedictine monastery of Wisques. In 1961, a papal indult authorized him to pursue studies and work outside the cloister. He took on stained glass in 1953. He used traditional techniques and employed reinforced concrete to hold the pieces of glass together (dalle de verre), while also creating in synthetic materials, such as polystyrene. Most of his works date back to the period between 1955 and 1963, and with the exception of a few early designs, the majority are abstract. His stained-glass windows can be found in fifty churches, mainly in France and Belgium. In Poland, he first appears in 1992 to present exhibitions of his creative output of 40 years entitled Beauty Shall Save the World. Their purpose is to show contemporary art, understood as abstract representation whose meaning and content is hidden under a composition of colourful blots. The only ensemble of stained-glass windows by Father Cholewka to be found in Poland is that present in the church of Saint John the Baptist in Kupno, near Kolbuszowa, produced between 1997 and 1998.