Józef Mehoffer (March 19, 1869, Ropczyce, Austria-Hungary – July 8, 1946, Wadowice) was a Polish artist, graphic artist, stained glass artist, and one of the most important figures of the Young Poland movement.

(Polish: Młoda Polska) is the Polish name for a period of development in literature, art, and music that spanned the years 1891–1918 and was associated with the penetration of modernism into Polish culture.

J. Mehoffer first studied painting at the Krakow School of Fine Arts under Jan Matejko and Isidor Jabłoński, then studied at the University of Vienna and the Academy of Fine Arts, and at the Paris School of Fine Arts. He was an outstanding master of artistic graphics, etching, aquatint, and lithography. Józef Mehoffer was the creator of a large number of works of so-called “everyday graphics”: book covers and illustrations, vignettes, bookplates, ornaments, posters and initials. He was engaged in the design of trademarks, shares and banknotes. He created many portraits, including historical figures.

J. Mehoffer is also known as the author of stained glass windows in the Vienna Secession style in the churches of Fribourg and Krakow, as well as wall paintings in the Armenian Church in Lviv and in the Wawel in Krakow.
He was one of the founders of the Association of Polish Artists “Art”.

Among his students, among others, were Zdzisław Eichler, Wincenty Drabik, Roman Sielski, Roman Kramsztyk and Jan Cybis.

In Krakow, the house of the famous artist Józef Mehoffer, a beautiful garden with a small cafe, has been carefully preserved. One of the best places for breakfast in the warm season. The house-museum is really incredibly beautiful, so I suggest a short excursion to old Poland.

The brick house was built in this place after the great fire of Krakow in 1850. It was a one-story building belonging to the Rogowski family. After 1872, Joseph Shuysky and his family lived in it. He expanded the house according to the plans of A. Luszkiewicz, giving it the classical appearance of a city palace. After Shuysky’s death, the Tarnowski family bought the house and leased it out. When Józef Mehoffer bought it in 1932, the building needed renovation. The work took three years. The artist furnished the interior with stylish furniture, works of art, some related to his family for many years.

Mehoffer’s own works and objects that he collected were also found here. After the artist’s death in 1946, the family sought to preserve the unchanged character of the premises. In the 60s. On the initiative of the artist’s son Zbigniew Mehoffer, the idea of ​​creating a museum here arose. In 1986, the family donated the house with the garden to the National Museum in Krakow. Ten years later, it was opened to visitors as the Józef Mehoffer House – Branch of the National Museum in Krakow.

The two-story house is located on the ground floor of a wide entrance hall leading into the house and the garden. On the first floor of the building, on the front side, there are technical rooms, as well as the museum’s safes. The southern part, overlooking the garden, is occupied by representative rooms: a living room with a terrace and a descent into the garden, a library and a dining room.

A spacious staircase with a glass porch leads to the second floor, where the old rooms of the artist and his family are located. In the part of the house on the street side there was a room for the artist’s son and daughter-in-law, a tennis room, and an interesting Japanese room. On the garden side there was the bedroom of Mehoffer’s wife with an adjoining boudoir and salon, as well as the room of Józef Mehoffer.

The current interiors are decorated, and some of them are faithfully recreated from surviving photographs and images, as well as family advice. The apartments contain furniture and works of art – gifts and deposits of the family, as well as exhibits from the National Museum in Krakow’s own collections. Thanks to the careful design of the interior, it was dedicated to the climate of the era. The atmosphere of the private house is created by paintings depicting the artist’s wife.

The garden behind the house, which was renovated in 2003, is also very interesting. Today it belongs to the system once given to it by Józef Mehoffer, and, incidentally, because of this, it is a continuation of the exhibition.