Jacek Malczewski, Wigilia na Syberii [Christmas Eve in Siberia], 1982

I don't like Christmas Eve; it's the saddest day of the year. Perhaps this is so, because in the past, when I was a child, it was so joyful and I looked forward to it so muchà But my childhood ended abruptly on September 1^st 1939. Then my waiting for my father began and each Christmas Eve was a reminder that a year had again passed without him.