Wall paintings preserved in the medieval chapel of St. Anna at the hospital of St. Ducha in Frombork, were partially uncovered from under several layers of plaster and whitewashed by conservators from Królewiec in 1931. The scope of conservation work then included only the apse with the most valuable, as it was rightly believed, representation of the Last Judgment. The work was supervised by Otto Steinbrecht, nephew of the famous conservator Konrad Steinbrecht, who at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries carried out, among others, many conservation works at the Malbork Castle, and in 1907 he and his team restored the medieval Marian polyptych from the Frombork Cathedral.

Further conservation work on this painting was carried out in 1961 by a team from the Gdańsk branch of the State Police. Monument Conservation Workshops in Gdańsk, under the supervision of Barbara Grabowska. In 1981, Janina Piaskowska partially uncovered the partially preserved painted decorations on the walls of the chapel and in its side oratories from underneath the later plasters and whitewashing. In the years 1987-1989, Jacek Wziątek and his team carried out full conservation of the Last Judgment painting. He also restored the geometric 19th-century painting decoration with gilded stucco stars on the wooden barrel vault of the chapel.

In the years 2006-2008, conservation of all wall paintings in the chapel of St. Anna was entrusted to Andrzej Paczesny, who uncovered the remains of paintings in the upper parts of the walls of the chapel and in its two oratories and made a successful attempt to merge the existing polychrome and its partial reconstruction. The paintings preserved in the chapel have features of the art used to decorate medieval incunabula. Only the painted curtain on the eastern wall was made when, in 1712, a large, no longer existing, two-story altar of the Good Shepherd was placed in this place.

Until recently, it was generally believed that the author of the painted decoration in the apse of the chapel (apart from the Baroque curtain) was the Frombork city writer Krzysztof Blumenroth, who in 1434 copied the Bible for Canon Salendorf, because the way of illustrating it was almost identical to the paintings preserved here. The remaining paintings dated to the beginning of the 16th century. However, tests of dyes and binders, as well as the structure of plasters carried out in 2007 in the university laboratory of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń showed that all the preserved polychrome, in the apse, on the walls of the chapel and in its oratories, were made at the same time and their creation should be related to the time of the Antonite preceptory / 1507- 1519/. If further research confirms this fact, it will be interesting that the paintings in the chapel were created in the first years of Nicolaus Copernicus's stay in Warmia.

The most valuable element of the iconographic program contained in the chapel's wall paintings is the Last Judgment covering its apse. The composition is divided into 19 scenes placed on four levels. The theme of the Last Judgment is presented here in a form consistent with the iconography of this depiction. Christ – Judge, angels summoning judgment, the dead coming out of their graves. Archangel Gabriel weighing souls, the Virgin Mary and Saint. John the Baptist as intercessors, an angel fighting with the devil for souls, devils leading sinners to hell, images of deadly sins. All figures are woven into a schematic, linear plant decoration that runs across the entire surface of the painting. In the upper strip of painted decoration, the central figure is Christ in a mandorla, sitting on a double rainbow arch. Behind his head there is a cross nimbus, and three lilies come out of his mouth on the left and a sword on the right - as typical symbols of grace and punishment. Four angels, placed in pairs on both sides of the figure of Christ, blow trumpets, announcing the arrival of the Last Judgment. Below, on the right side of the Supreme Judge, stands Mary, covering those asking for intercession with the cloak of mercy. On the opposite side, kneeling, dressed in the skin of Saint. John the Baptist. A little lower, Archangel Michael weighs souls. The right scales are tipped by the soul holding a magical triangle with circles at the corners. It symbolizes, perhaps, the Holy Trinity. On the left scale, going up, sits a figure weighed down by a mill wheel. A hairy devil placed on its edge tries unsuccessfully to outweigh it. On the same level there are loosely scattered figures of the dead rising from their graves. The more vivid, and therefore the most interesting, scenes include devils, introducing an element of movement into the static composition. The devil, in the painter's intentions, shows great activity, wanting to do as much evil as possible. Sometimes he drags a usurer on a rope, sometimes he fights with an angel for his soul, sometimes he carries a greedy sinner in a wheelbarrow. In addition to devils acting individually, there are also devils acting in pairs, e.g. tempting a married couple, signifying the sin of impurity. Above this scene there is an inscription in Gothic minuscule superbia - pride, which would confirm that this part of the decoration is about representing the deadly sins. The lowest strip of paintings, just above the floor level, is the worst preserved and, judging from the poorly legible fragments of architecture on the one side and the red flames on the other, it was supposed to represent the Heavenly Jerusalem on the right of Christ and the depths of hell on the left. It is currently difficult to fully reconstruct the original iconographic program of the painting, because several scenes were destroyed when the door leading to the sacristy built in 1709 was broken through.

Also on the side walls of the chapel, the wall with the chancel arch and in the side oratories, fragments of wall paintings with zachaeuszkas, plant tendrils, and representations of people and animals have been preserved. Due to the incomplete iconographic context preserved, the symbolism of these representations has not yet been sufficiently explained. Zodiac symbolism seems to play a significant role here. The interior of the chapel was once surrounded by a frieze with a minuscule inscription. Only a small fragment of it has been preserved.

Considering the original iconographic program identified so far, it can be assumed that the creator of the paintings was much closer to theology than to the arcana of wall painting. It should also be assumed that he was a miniaturist, and the polychrome in the chapel of St. Anny was the artist's first and probably last work in the field of monumental painting.

The painted decoration of the Frombork chapel fully deserves recognition as a typical example of the activity of provincial artists. This trend of creativity, although we do not attribute decisive importance to it, cannot under any circumstances be omitted. It is necessary for a comprehensive understanding of the history of art, not only of a city or region, but also of the country.

Tadeusz Piaskowski

Literature:
Arszyński Marian, Kutzner Marian, Catalog of Art Monuments. Braniewo, Frombork, Orneta and surroundings. Elbląg Voivodeship, Warsaw 1980.
Brachvogel Eugen, Ermlands grostes mittelalterliches Wandgemalde in Frauenburg, Ermlandische Zeitung, Jg 64, 1935.
Piaskowski Tadeusz, Poklewski Józef, Painting of the Last Judgment in the chapel of St. Anna in Frombork, Frombork Commentaries. Issue 4. Olsztyn 1972.
Piaskowski Tadeusz, Henryk Szkop, Monuments of Frombork, Frombork 2003.