ABOUT JAN ALOJZY MATEJKO
Polish painter who was known for leading the 19th-century exponent of history painting and for depicting nodal events from Polish history. His works include large scale oil paintings such as Rejtan, the Union of Lublin, the Astronomer Copernicus, or Conversations with God and the Battle of Grunwald.
He attended St. Anne's High School, but he dropped out in 1851 because of poor grades. At the age of 14, he entered the School of Fine Arts in Kraków.
He also worked as a prolific portraitist.
From 1864 to 1893, he was married to Teodora Matejko. They had five children named Tadeusz, Regina, Beata, Jerzy and Helena Unierzyska.
In January 1889, he received an unsolicited letter from the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche .
