Ryszard Demel was born to Italian-Polish and Czech parents in Ustroń, Poland in 1921. Arriving in England with the so-called Anders' Army after the end of the Second World War in 1946, Demel studied with the Polish School of Painting and Graphic Design in exile (1946–48), and later stained-glass at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in London (graduating in 1951). Remaining in England until 1962, Demel taught history of art at high schools in Hastings, Sussex, contributing to the restoration of church windows, and establishing his own stained-glass workshop in which he patented a process of 'refractive stained glass'.
Stained-glass artist, teacher and academic, Ryszard Demel was born in Ustroń, Poland on 21 December 1921 to Italian-Polish and Czechoslovak parents. Following his education at Andrychów and at the State School of Economics in Bielsko-Biała, Demel joined the military units of the Border Protection Corps after the Invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union in September 1939, which lead to his capture and imprisonment by the Red Army in Kobryn. Eventually escaping Russian captivity and a typhus outbreak, Demel returned to his family home in Andrychów where he worked for the post office until 1942. Subsequently employed in transporting communication and postal materials from Germany to various fronts, Demel fell ill with pneumonia while on an assignment in Rovigo, Italy in 1944. Upon recovery and release from hospital by American troops, Demel joined General Władysław Anders’ Second Corps of the Polish Army, then stationed in Italy during the Italian Campaign (1943–45). As a reward for his active and creative work in the army, he was one of 36 Polish soldiers (including Leon Piesowocki and Alexander Werner) whom the Corps Command authorised to study at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome.
After the artist students of the Second Corps arrived in England, between 1946 and 1948 Demel studied at the School of Painting and Graphic Design in exile at Waldingfield (near Sudbury) under the guidance of painter Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, another Anders's artist and founder of the School. There, Demel was taught easel painting and graphics. Following the school’s relocation to a student camp in Kingwood Common (near Reading) in 1947, Demel received his diploma and took a central role in the awards ceremony and its accompanying exhibition: he produced the catalogue cover, created linocut invitations, addressed the English guests, and subsequently guided visitors around the exhibition in its two-month run. However, with an uncertain future, the school eventually relocated to a hotel in Bayswater, London in October 1948 at the decision of the Polish government in exile. From there, Demel was appointed to run a Nude Workshop at the London Confraternity of Polish Artists, and he joined the Young Artists Association (YAA) which comprised of members from the Rome Academy and from Bohusz-Szyszko’s Polish School. After organising one exhibition at the Kingly Gallery on Regent Street, however, the YAA disbanded due to internal divisions. Demel was among the 14 leading artists of the Association who founded the smaller Grupa 49 (Group 49), named after the year of its formation. The Group lasted ten years and other artists included Tadeusz Beutlich, Kazimierz Dźwig, Stanislaw Frenkiel, Marian Kościałkowski, Piesowocki and Werner.
In addition to organising and participating in Polish collectives, in 1948–49 Demel graduated from the Sir John Cass Institute of Art, in London, as well as the department of filmmaking at the Slade School of Fine Art where Russian émigré, Vladimir Polunin (friend of Pablo Picasso and collaborator with Sergei Diaghilev of the Ballets Russes) taught stage design. Following Polunin’s death, Demel obtained a scholarship to specialise in stained glass, a long-neglected artform, at London County Council's Central School of Arts and Crafts. While studying there, he worked as the first assistant to well-known stained-glass artist (and German immigrant) Joseph Edward Nuttgens at his studio at Piggott’s Hill near High Wycombe, taking up a permanent position after graduating in 1951. Among many Anders’ Army artists who were offered work by churches, one of Demel’s first commissions in Nuttgens’ studio was to reconstruct a medieval stained-glass window in St Etheldreda’s Church in Ely Place, London which had been damaged during the war. Demel left Nuttgens’ studio in 1952 due to family reasons. Having married Anna Parisi, whom he met in Padua during the war, the family settled in Hastings, East Sussex where they bought a house with a studio by the sea, and had a daughter, Luiza and a son, Piotr. Demel taught art history at three high schools in Hastings, and he set up his stained-glass workshop and experimented with the effects of light in mosaic compositions, patenting ‘refractive stained glass’ (which combines the technique of Byzantine mosaic with the technique of stained glass to make the light passing through more intense and enriched). Among other projects, Demel worked on the reconstruction of four local historic stained-glass windows for the Convent of the Holy Child Jesus in St. Leonards-on-Sea and the St. Peter’s Church in Bexhill-on-Sea. During the 1960s Demel also showed his artwork at venues run by Polish émigré gallerists, including Jan Wieliczko's Centaur Gallery and the Grabowski Gallery, both in London.
After ten years in Hastings, Demel moved to Padua, Italy in 1962. Since establishing himself as an English Language teacher and lecturer and stained-glass artist in Padua (his most famous work there being a series of five stained glass windows in the Duomo), he obtained many accolades and qualifications, including a doctorate in Polish Philology from the Polish University in London in 1981. Ryszard Demel died in Padua, Italy on 23 September 2023. His work is not currently represented in any UK public collections.
Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Ryszard Demel]
Publications related to [Ryszard Demel] in the Ben Uri Library