Of the two works of Merkel, purchased by Raczyński in 1906 in the Kraków TPSP, portrait of a woman painted by the artist at the end of his study in the Academy of Fine Arts under J. Mehoffer preserved to this day. Its linear, Art Nouveau form has a high dependence on Young Polish art, especially works of Mehoffer and Wyspiański. Uniform colors, based on the range of grays stressing the importance of strokes and producing specific mood will be repeated in later works, created in the circle of the École de Paris, in which the artist became involved during his long stays in Paris and Concernau. Merkel being friends with E. Zak and other Polish artists, despite settling in Vienna and after 1938, again in Paris did not lose contact with the country, exhibiting in the salons of Kraków, Warsaw, Łódź and Lviv. He was also one of the founders of the Society of Polish Artists and a member of the Vienna "Secession" and "Hagenbundu".
[dr E.Leszczyńska]
