After exhibiting Francesco Guardi’s Palace Stairs, A Black Woman by Anna Bilińska, three paintings by Aleksander Gierymski and Diana by Jean-Antoine Houdon, we present the history of The Interior of the Cathedral in Milan, the work of the most outstanding Polish vedutista of the 19th century – Marcin Zaleski, as well as the image of the artist.As a result of World War II, several hundred thousand objects from Polish public, private and church collections were lost. Some of them vanished forever, destroyed as a result of the war, others fell victim to the systematic plunder of Polish cultural goods carried out by specialized groups operating in the ranks of the occupying Nazi army and in the Red Army, as well as by ordinary soldiers or robbers. The rich artistic legacy of Marcin Zaleski also suffered greatly during the war. The fate of many of his works remains unknown to this day.The Interior of the Cathedral in Milan by Marcin Zaleski was considered lost for over 70 years. Most likely stolen from the building of the National Museum after the Warsaw Uprising, the work was returned to the home collection in September 2019 thanks to the efforts of the Ministry of Culture, National Heritage and Sports and with the support of Friends of the National Museum in Warsaw Association.The painting and other works by Marcin Zaleski can be admired each day in the 19th Century Art Gallery of the National Museum in Warsaw. In the Kordegarda, next to The Interior of the Cathedral in Milan, the interiors of two Warsaw churches located near the gallery are also presented: the Visitation Sisters Church and the Cathedral of St. John as well as two paintings by Zaleski that prove his artistry also in other genres of LOST / RECOVERED INTERIOR OF THE CATHEDRAL IN MILAN BY MARCIN ZALESKI Marcin Zaleski, Self-Portrait, ca. 1840, oil on canvas, National Museum in Warsaw photo Piotr Ligier / National Museum in Warsaw Marcin Zaleski, Interior of the School of Fine Arts in Warsaw, 1858, oil on canvas, National Museum in Warsaw photo Piotr Ligier / National Museum in Warsaw Marcin Zaleski, Interior of the Visitation Sisters Church in Warsaw, ca. 1860, oil on canvas, National Museum in Warsaw photo Piotr Ligier / National Museum in Warsaw Marcin Zaleski, Interior of the St. John’s Cathedral in Warsaw, 1865, oil on canvas, National Museum in Warsaw photo Krzysztof Wilczyński / National Museum in Warsaw painting, apart from the representa – tions of architecture: Self-Portrait of the artist and The Interior of the School of Fine Arts in Warsaw, where he taught for many years.The history of the restitution of The Interior of the Cathedral in Milan focuses on the empty, original frame of this painting. When the work was stolen, the frame remained in the museum storage, where years later it was identified as a frame from the sought-after work by Marcin Zaleski. The empty frame can serve as a symbol of wartime losses. There are still many such empty frames in the warehouses of Polish museums.The magnitude of Polish war losses is huge and difficult to precisely estimate. Although almost 80 years have passed since the end of World War II, the Polish state continues to search for its lost cultural property. Thanks to the work of the Division for Looted Art in the Department of Cultural Heritage Abroad and Wartime Losses in the Ministry of Culture, National Heritage and Sports, over 500 valuable works of art have returned to their home collections in recent years. Several dozen resti – tution cases are pending in Poland and around the world. It is also very important to popularize the subject of war losses and restitution. Remembering the works lost from Polish collections, publishing images of lost objects, as well as recounting successful restitution cases and the return of works to native collections measurably contribute to finding lost cultural goods.Organisers: Ministry of Culture, National Heritage and Sports; National Centre for Culture; National Museum in WarsawCurator: Ewa Witkowska (MKDNiS) Coordinator: Agnieszka Bebłowska Bednarkiewcz (NCK)Scholar consultants: dr hab. Agnieszka Rosales Rodríguez (MNW) Michał Przygoda (MNW) Exhibition design and key visual: Matosek / Niezgoda Production: IKG Aleksander Sieklicki