3-069-010 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Allegorical Portrait of Stanislaw August Poniatowski with an Hourglass, after 1793. The signing of the partition agreement between Russia and Prussia on 23 January 1793 in St. Petersburg made Stanislaw August Poniatowski aware of the approaching end of his reign. In February or March 1793, he commissioned Marcello Bacciarelli, his court painter, to paint an allegorical portrait and specified in detail the way he would be depicted. In the original painting, the king looks at the storm raging outside the window and rays of light falling from the sky, and the accompanying attributes deepen the dramatic overtone of the depicted scene: an hourglass depicted in a crown and lightning striking the ground signify the imminent end of his reign. Two years later, after the defeat of the Kosciuszko Uprising, which was supposed to save independence, and after the Third Partition of Polish, which finally put an end to the existence of the country, the king abdicated in favor of Russia. Barbara Ciciora-Czwórnóg