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The study presents the work and life of Colonel Andrei Vladimirovici Potocki, bom in Sankt-Petersburg on 5th January 1886, who became officer of one of the most prestigious units of the Russian Imperial Guard, the "Pavlovski" Regiment. As early as the beginning of his military career, Andrei Potocki showed some artistic interest, drawing military uniforms, illustrating military photographic albums with graphic design vignettes or making cartoons for some of his regimental comrades. Within this elite regiment, Andrei Potocki bravely fought during the First World War and was decorated with important Russian imperial orders: St. Ana, St. Stanislas, St. Vladimir, St. George. During the war, he was wounded in action, in the battles of 1916. At the outbreak of the February Revolution of 1917 and especially after the Bolshevik coup of October 1917, Andrei Potocki, who reached the rank of Colonel, naturally chose to join the White movement. In 1919, he served as a division commander in the "Russian Volunteer Army of the West", who fought in the Baltic region. After the defeat of the White movement, still in unclear circumstances, Andrei Potocki arrived in Romania where, in 1920, he met at Iasi and married Miss Cecilia Vrânceanu. Since 1925, Andrei Potocki has started an intense collaboration with the National Military Museum in Bucharest, founded two years earlier in Park Carol. Initially he worked as an external graphic illustrator, then, after obtaining the Romanian citizenship in 1928, he obtained a permanent job, as a technical assistant (equivalent to current museographer). Interested on military history, benefiting of a real artistic skill and heaving a special power of work, Andrei Potocki made hundreds of drawings and watercolors representing weapons, decorations, uniforms, flags, most of which remained in the manuscript stage, and therefore they are a little or complete unknown to military historians. His most important work is undoubtedly the famous album "The Uniforms of the Romanian Army, 1830-1930", published in a mix Romanian-French version, at "Marvan" publishing house, in 1930, which is still today a reference work for the Romanian military historiography. Plates of Romanian soldiers from different epochs of modern history, copied from this album have been and continue to be reproduced, often without indicating or knowing the source. The publication of the album, initiated and encouraged by General Radu R. Rosetti, then President of the National Military Museum Council, led to Andrei Potocki's promotion as a reserve senior officer of the Romanian Army in 1929 and his awarding with the order "The Crown of Romania", commander grade, on 10th May, 1930. During the following period, Colonel Andrei Potocki continued to work as a specialist in weapons and uniforms at the National Military Museum, producing a great number of drawings and color illustrations related to the past of the Romanian military or carrying out intensive research work, translating from Russian or German important works of uniformology or detecting and transcribing hundreds of official high orders related to the organization of the Romanian army found in periodical publications of the 19th century. On 5th January 1946, at the age of 60, Colonel Andrei Potocki was kicked out of the National Military Museum, being pensioned, in time to not endure the persecutions which affected the officers of the former Tsarist army, especially those who fought against the Red Army during the Russian Civil War. Andrei Potocki died in unknown circumstances in 1957 and was buried at Bellu Cemetery in Bucharest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2016, the National Library of Romania has carried out a series of events within the „Centenary 2018" national project, one of them being the series of exhibitions Romania in the First World War - 1916-1918 organized between 2016-2019. All this historical journey has been extensively documented, under its various aspects, in the pages of the album Romania in the First World War on the Way to the Great Union - 1916-1918, published with the support of the Centenary Department within the Ministry of Culture and National Identity. The volume aims to reach the deepest levels of the Romanian collective consciousness from everywhere, to elucidate and present the real and objective key steps in establishing the Romanian state, of the national evolution from the most diverse and important territories inhabited by Romanians. The album contains images that cover a wide range of documents: archive, photos, press, maps, printed music with the subject of Romania's participation in the First World War and the achievement of Greater Romania. All their originals are part of the national patrimony held by the Special Collections of the National Library of Romania and selected from the collections of the Cabinet of the Historical Archive, the Cabinet of Photography, the Cabinet of Old Romanian Periodicals, the Cabinet of Music and the Cabinet of Cartography. Also, the album contains extremely valuable social and political information, appeared in articles from the press of the time, supplemented at times with small fragments selected from reliable sources, memories, and analyzes, indicated in the bibliography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]