Jan Rustem

Training under Jean-Pierre Norblin de La Gourdaine and Marcello Bacciarelli is recorded. Karol Rypiński, Jonas Joteika and Jan Damel are recorded as having studied under Jan Rustem. The recorded working language is Armenian. The field of work recorded is painting. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are portrait. Places of work recorded in the authority are Poland. Employment is recorded with Vilnius University. Work by Jan Rustem is recorded in the collections of National Museum in Warsaw, Lithuanian National Museum of Art, Museum of the Warsaw Archdiocese and National Museum in Wrocław.

He was born in Constantinople, and as a young orphan boy was sponsored by Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski, who invited him to the Commonwealth around 1774. Czartoryski paid for his studies in Warsaw, where among his tutors were Jean-Pierre Norblin de La Gourdaine and Marcello Bacciarelli. Between 1788 and 1790, he moved to Germany, where he became a freemason. Two years later he returned to the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth and lived for some time in Warsaw, later moving to Vilnius. Following the partitions of the Commonwealth, Rustem started working for Vilnius University, as an assistant to Franciszek Smuglewicz. After Smuglewicz's death, the professorship of Fine Art was awarded in 1810 to the Englishman, Joseph Saunders and Rustem became his collaborator. In 1811, he became a professor of sketching and in 1819 became a professor of painting. Rustem retired in 1826, but continued to give lectures until his death, which occurred near Dūkštas, Lithuania. Among his successful students were Taras Shevchenko, Józef Oleszkiewicz, Kanuty Rusiecki, and Michał Kulesza.

• Illustration — Michał Józef Römer • Illustration — Jan Śniadecki • Illustration — Stanisław Bonifacy Jundziłł • Illustration — Krystyna Frank, wife of Dr. Józef Frank