On display until December 31st, head this winter to the Old Town’s Museum of Warsaw and one will find a cloakroom adorned with a stunning series of murals honouring the women that played such a vital role in the city’s reconstruction. The idea of artist Paulina Włostowska, the large format mural shifts away from the habit of telling this historic period through a patriotic prism to instead lionise the female artists that decorated the city during the final stages of its post-war rebirth.

Stylistically based on Wojciech Fangor’s ‘Forging a Scythe’ – a work, incidentally, that can be viewed inside the museum – Włostowska sought to present the reconstruction process from a less idealistic viewpoint as to that showcased by Fangor.

It was women such as Zofia Artymowska, Hanna Żuławska, Krystyna Kozłowska, Zofia Czarnocka-Kowalska, Krystyna Łada-Studnicka and Helena Grześkiewicz that were behind the reliefs and frescoes that came to decorate the rebuilt tenements in Warsaw’s historic quarter, and it is these women that Włostowska seeks to celebrate.

Drawing directly from the patterns developed by these creative teams, Włostowska combines visual quotes into a coherent whole and introduces elements of urban ornamentation and decorative motifs taken from archives and photographic documentation,” say the museum. “She includes the profiles of the heroines of the story within the work itself, to remind us of their activities and restore their visibility and presence.

“Painting Works Cooperative”, mural by Paulina Włostowska, Museum of Warsaw, photo: Tomasz Kaczor