Biography and current catalogue for

Aleksander Zyw (1905-1995) 

Zyw was born in Lida, Poland (now in Belarus) and studied at Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts from 1926 to 1932. He then travelled in Dalmatia, Haley and Greece before working in Paris 1934 - 1939, when he joined the Polish Army as a machine gunner. In 1940 he escaped to Scotland, where he became War Artist to the Polish forces, and met and married his wife, Leslie. He had his first one man show at the Scottish Gallery in 1945. He drew and painted landscapes, townscapes and figure subjects. Zyw had spent increasing amounts of time in Italy since the 1950's building up a successful olive-oil enterprise now sold world wide. He continued to paint into his old age and only became restricted to sketching in small sketchbooks in the last year or two of his life. An exhibition of his work was held at the Calton Gallery in 2001. Afternote: Zyw's is the last entry among the many thousands of artists listed in Benezit's world authority Dictionary of painters, sculptors, illustrators and engravers.