Stanisław Ostoja-Chrostowski won the bronze medal for his work Dyplom Yacht Klubu R. P. dla Gen. E. Smigłego-Rydza in the category Applied Graphics at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. Ostoja-Chrostowski studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warszawa and was a graphic artist and a member of numerous artist associations in Poland and the United States. He was a sculptor, painter and graphic artist who specialized in woodcuts and was an exceptional graphic artist of the interwar period. Ostoja-Chrostowski also received various art awards for his lithographs and woodcuts. In 1937, he was appointed to the chair of Artistic Graphics and from 1946 served as a full professor and first rector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warszawa after World War II. He was also Head of Division II-999 in the Department of Information and Intelligence Headquarters of the Army, and a member of the Supreme Council of the Society of Polish-Soviet Friendship. His daughter Halina Chrostowska (1929-90) also became a painter and graphic artist.
Ostoja-Chrostowski mainly designed vignettes, securities, stamps, telegrams, invitations, Christmas cards, programs, and menus, but his greatest passion, which brought him worldwide fame, were illustrations for books and bookplates. His Dyplom Yacht Klubu R. P. dla Gen. E. Smiglego-Rydza (Diploma of the Yacht Club of the Republic of Poland for Gen. E. Smiglego-Rydza) was based on his woodcut design Korweta (Corvette). It is also possible that only this figurative part of the diploma (27 x 24 cm) was submitted. The Officers’ Yacht Club RP was founded, under a different name, in 1919 as a rowing club. The club was later named after Edward Śmigły-Rydz (1886-1941), a Polish politician and Marshal of Poland as well as a painter and poet.
Poland