In contrast to the others, it was designed as an open-air structure, with a scene on an isle separated from the audience by water. It is a unique example of this type of theatre on the global scale. This Classicist park building with Pre-Romantic elements, designed by one of the most interesting architects of the Stanisław August era, has survived in a nearly intact form to this day.

History

King Stanisław August Poniatowski planned the construction of a new theatre at a pond in his suburban residence in 1784, when only the so-called “Small Theatre” functioned within the complex. In 1786 a makeshift summer theatre already stood on the eastern bank of the southern pond. Its audience consisted of 3 rows of benches placed on the bank, while the scene decorated with artificial rocks with a grotto was placed on an isle planted with trees, which was formed in 1783 during the broadening of the previous canal. In 1787 the audience was transformed into a semi-circular earthen amphitheatre covered with turf and topped with canvas tented roof stretched between the posts. 69 benches painted green were placed on its steps. Floors were laid on the scene and the orchestra pit. Initially, it was possible to access the isle only by boat. Later a small bridge was built over the pond on its western bank. Incorporating the scene into the park landscape gave the spectacles an aura of greater authenticity and allowed moving parts of the show onto boats. In 1790 the earthen amphitheatre was replaced with a brick one, and just like the former one it was designed by Jan Christian Kamsetzer. It was a public theatre and the audience, modelled upon the amphitheatre in Herculaneum, could host nearly 1000 persons. At the bank, a single-storey section with the royal lodge was erected. It was decorated on the sides with sculptures moved from the terrace of the Palace on the Water. Lower steps of the amphitheatre audience were made of stone, while the upper ones were wooden and included benches painted grey and green. In 1793 figures sculpted by Tomasso Righi, according to drawings by André Le Brun, were placed on a parapet behind the audience, using a technique of applying the material to the surface and then modelling it. Those were 16 statues of prominent playwrights and 2 allegorical groups, standing on the western gables, depicting comedy and tragedy. Scene decorations included artificial ruins that constituted a compilation of models of antique buildings reproduced in popular publications, focusing especially on the ruins of the Jupiter Temple in Baalbek and the Forum Romanum. Placed against the park greenery, they set themselves within the then fashionable sentimentalism. A modern feature of this theatre was the lack of a scene portal. On the side of the orchestra pit, a sculpture authored by Franciszek Pinck was placed, which represented a lion with water, pumped from the Vistula river, splashing from his maws. The first spectacle after the reconstruction took place on 7 September 1791, on the anniversary of the king’s election. “Cleopatra”, a ballet of Abbé Renaud, whose plot allowed the use of a boat in the staging, was shown. The feature functioned as the royal scene until the Partition of Poland and in 1817, for the period of nearly 100 years, it fell into the hands of the Russian Tzar, along with the entire complex of Łazienki Królewskie. Both closed and public performances were staged (after the renovation in 1822). Over time, the condition of the feature worsened. In 1895 it was renovated and new wooden dressing rooms were erected behind the scene. Improperly repaired cracked sculptures on the parapet only accelerated their destruction, while humidity damaged wooden elements on the isle. During the refurbishment of the amphitheatre in the years 1920-1927 the destroyed statues were removed. They were replaced with 8 quite remote copies sculpted in sandstone by Stanisław Jakubowski. During World War II the amphitheatre suffered minor damage. In the course of renovation works in the years 1946-47 the scene was redesigned and wooden buildings were lowered by a storey. The most recent renovations of the feature took place in 1996 and in the years 2013-2015. A descent to the pond in the royal lodge was restored at that time.

Description

The amphitheatre is located on the east side of the lower south pond of the Łazienki Królewskie park in Warsaw. The audience is separated from the scene, located on an isle planted with trees, by a water canal, over which stretches a wooden bridge on the south side. The scene, widening towards the audience, is preceded by a bow-shaped orchestra pit, terminating at the south end in stairs leading to the water and at the north end in a pedestal with a figure of a reclining lion made of yellow sandstone. The scene decoration has a form of antique ruins with cracked columns and pilasters of the parts of walls in the Corinthian order. On the south side, a tall arcaded passage leads from the stairs to the backstage. It features a wall on the side of the scene decorated with a rectangular niche, terminating in a triangular pediment hosting a gypsum statue of Flora by Jan Dult. Above, over the entablature, there is a figure of a woman (Muse) without a head and arms. The analogous niche from the north is pierced by an irregular, oblong hole. On the south and north sides, the backstage is made of wooden, single-storey structures (former dressing rooms) with irregular floor plans, decorated with plate rustications carved in wood. In the audience section, on the bank of the canal, the stone steps reach the water level. They are framed on the sides by a baluster fence and pedestals, on which copies of antique sculptures have been placed: “Dying gladiator” and “Dying Cleopatra.” On the axis, there is a rectangular platform of the royal lodge with a descent to the water, separated by iron barriers protruding from stone posts. A semi-circular amphitheatre rises behind the passage. In the lower part simple steps under the benches are interrupted on the axis by stairs leading to parts of the audience with semi-circular steps. There, behind a broad pedestal, the stairs diverge to the sides, leading to the uppermost section separated by a balustrade. The entirety is crowned with a masonry parapet with bases of former sculptures. Currently, several of them serve as a base for 8 hard-to-identify copies of figures of sitting playwrights. The bow-shaped rear façade of the amphitheatre is pierced at the bottom by 12 arcades alternately adorned in the finial with motifs of lyre and mask, leading to a corridor with a barrel vault. Annexes with half-turn stairs leading to the crown of the audience were added at the north and south end. The external walls are decorated with rustication.

The structure can be viewed from the outside.

Compiled by Małgorzata Laskowska-Adamowicz, National Institute of Cultural Heritage, Regional Branch in Warsaw 23-11-2017

Bibliography

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