upon his return to Poland, joined the ranks of the Polish Army and fought as a NCO in the crew of one of the armoured trains on the fronts of the Polish-Soviet War. For his merits he was awarded the Virtuti Militari, the highest Polish military decoration. Paris Committee and Second World War In 1921, Czapski entered the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków, where he was taught by Wojciech Weiss and Józef Pankiewicz. Moving away from the classical tradition, he moved to Paris in 1924 where he helped to develop the Komitet Paryski (Paris Committee, subsequently abbreviated to the 'Kapist' movement). Czapski began to hold exhibitions of his work but, encouraged by Ludwik Hering, increasingly moved to becoming a critic, writing essays on art, literature, and philosophy. He returned to Poland in 1932, re-enlisting in 1939. He was subsequently captured by the Russians and held in prison and labour camps; he was one of 395 who avoided the fate of more than 20,000 murdered at Katyn and similar massacres. After the 1941 German invasion of Russia and signing the Sikorski-Mayski Agreement, Czapski joined the Polish II Corps under the command of General Anders. Between 1941 and 1942, Czapski was tasked with investigating the disappearance of Poles who had been in the captivity of the NKVD and subsequently massacred. He never received any satisfactory answers as to the fate of these men, but wrote about his experiences in two books, Reminiscences of Starobyelsk (1944) and The Inhuman Land (1949). During that period Czapski also met Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy and Anna Akhmatova who is said to have dedicated one of her poems to him. Anders subsequently removed his army through the Persian Corridor, and in Baghdad Czapski began writing for the Polish army newspapers Orzeł Biały ('White Eagle') and Kurier Polski ('Polish Courier'). Emigration Czapski ended the war in Rome, and moved to France in 1946. Together with Maria Czapska, Gustaw Herling-Grudziński and Jerzy Giedroyc, he established the Instytut Literacki (Literary Institute) at Maisons-Laffitte, where he lived until his death, and contributed to the Polish émigré literary journal 'Kultura'.He published also in the French press, including „Le Figaro Littéraire”, „Preuves”, „Gavroche”, „Nova et Vettera”, „Carrefour”. He co-organized Congress for Cultural Freedom in Berlin (1950). His paintings were exhibited in France, Switzerland, Great Britain, Brazil and Belgium. His works were virtually inaccessible in Poland – after Polish October he had 1957 exhibitions