Chopin Monument in Decius Park
Kraków Artists: Music
A monument to the composer and pianist Frédéric Chopin in the southern part of Decius Park in Wola Justowska, a work by Bronisław Chromy from 2005. The same sculptor created the monument to the Piwnica pod Baranami cabaret that stands in the same park.
History
The Fryderyk Chopin Monument stands in the southern part of Decius Park in Wola Justowska. It is the work of Bronisław Chromy from 2005. The sculptor had a lasting connection with this park: in 1995 his own gallery opened in the old bandshell, and since 2000 his Monument to the Piwnica pod Baranami cabaret has stood next to it.
Fryderyk Chopin was born in 1810 in Żelazowa Wola. He learned to play the piano with Wojciech Żywny, and in 1826-1829 studied harmony and counterpoint with Józef Elsner at the Warsaw Main School of Music. In November 1830 he left the country, never to return, and from October 1831 he lived in France. He died in Paris on 17 October 1849. On his deathbed he asked for his heart to be taken to Warsaw; it was carried there by his sister Ludwika, and in 1880 it was placed in a pillar of the Church of the Holy Cross.
Chopin's link with Wola Justowska is his Paris pupil, Princess Marcelina Czartoryska, who was with him when he died. From 1870 she lived in Kraków, at the Decius Villa, where she kept open house, soon known as a musical salon. The park was created around 1535 together with the villa as a retreat for Justus Ludwik Decius, secretary to King Sigismund the Old. In the Princess's time the villa was remodelled to a design by Tadeusz Stryjeński.
Did you know?
Bronisław Chromy also made other Chopin monuments: one stands in the Kraków Saltworks Museum in Wieliczka, the other on Oławska Street in Wrocław. Both were made in 2010.