A new album by pop superstar Lady Gaga features one of Poland’s most iconic paintings on its cover. The National Museum in Warsaw – where the work of art, which depicts a famous royal court jester called Stańczyk, is held – expressed its “shock” at the news.
On Tuesday, Lady Gaga made the surprise announcement that she is releasing a 13-track album entitled Harlequin as an accompaniment to the soundtrack for the upcoming film Joker: Folie à Deux, in which she stars as Harley Quinn alongside Joaquin Phoenix in the titular role.
While the main cover art for the album features the singer standing in the shower, Polish fans quickly noted that the cover of the vinyl version of the album (pictured above) shows a room in which Lady Gaga is lying on a bed, above which hangs a famous painting of a Polish court jester called Stańczyk.
The work was created in 1862 by Jan Matejko, often regarded as Poland’s “national painter”. It contrasts Stańczyk’s classic, playful jester’s outfit with his solemn expression and pose – a result of him contemplating the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth’s loss of the city of Smolensk to Russia in 1514.
Stańczyk is believed to have been a court jester to three 16th-century Polish kings: Alexander Jagiellon, Sigismund the Old and Sigismund Augustus.
While little is known with certainty about him, in the 18th and 19th centuries he became a popular and mythologised figure in Polish literature and art, often used as a symbol of wisdom and patriotism.
Matejko’s painting of the jester is an iconic image in Poland and was acquired by the National Museum in Warsaw in 1924. After being looted by Nazi Germany in World War Two, it was later returned to Poland.
On Wednesday, the National Museum wrote on social media of its “shock” at seeing the painting appear on Lady Gaga’s cover. “Of course, we know that there is only one real Joker!” they added.
The museum noted that the Stańczyk painting will soon be leaving Poland for a loan to the Louvre in Paris, where it will be part of an exhibition entitled “Figures du fou” (Figures of the Fool).
Meanwhile, Lady Gaga yesterday posted a video, which was filmed in the Louvre, featuring music from the new Joker film soundtrack. She posted it along with the hashtag #FiguresDuFou.
Matejko, whose paintings often depicted important moments in Polish history, was himself the subject of an exhibition at the National Gallery in London in 2021.
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Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
