scholarly journals A FORGOTTEN HERO: JAN MORAWIŃSKI (1907–1949)

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 62 ◽  
pp. 220-226
Author(s):  
Roman Olkowski
Keyword(s):  
National Museum ◽  
Cultural Goods ◽  
Museum Exhibits ◽  
Ww Ii ◽  
Nazi Occupation ◽  
Historic Monuments ◽  
The Times

Notes of a Curator at the National Museum published in 1970 in the second volume of the book Struggle for Cultural Goods is the only generally available testimony to saving the Wilanów historic monuments by Jan Morawiński, a forgotten hero from the times of WW II. Additionally priceless because of Morawiński documenting the looting of 137 paintings belonging to the pre-WW II Branicki collection at Wilanów. The above-mentioned Notes were published by the Państwowy Instytut Wydawniczy after the manuscript kept in the private archive of the author’s daughter Agnieszka Morawińska. The notes, however, resemble pieces of paper torn from a notebook in which an earlier chapter is missing. The missing chapter does exist, yet for unknown reasons was omitted in the two-volume Struggle for Cultural Goods. Warsaw 1939–1945 edited by Prof. Stanisław Lorentz. The present paper is based on Morawiński’s hand-written testimony, supported by archival sources and recollections of his colleagues from the National Museum in Warsaw (MNW). From August 1939 to August 1944, Jan Morawiński, together with others, was involved in saving precious museum exhibits in the Museum building, but also throughout Warsaw. He was involved in packing the historic monuments into crates which were to help them survive the toughest times, and he helped to put out fires at the Museum, risking his own life. Moreover, he rescued the Royal Castle collections during the hardest bombing of Warsaw, transporting them to the storages in Warsaw’s Jerozolimskie Avenue. For his dedication he was awarded the Virtuti Militari Cross of the 5th class by Gen. Juliusz Rómmel. After Warsaw’s surrender, he was assigned Head of MNW’s storerooms and inventories: when Director Lorentz was absent, he acted as his deputy. In the first period of the Nazi occupation he courageously faced German officials. Furthermore, he headed the clandestine action of inventorying and documenting German destructions and plundering. The knowledge amassed in this way was extremely helpful in the restitution of the looted historic monuments, not only museum ones. He also contributed to documenting the destruction of the Warsaw Castle. Imprisoned by the Nazis, he went through Gestapo’s hands at Daniłowiczowska Street in Warsaw. Later on, he became manager of the Museum of Old Warsaw in the Old Town, at the same time acting as a guardian of the Wilanów collection. Following the defeat of the Warsaw Uprising, he participated in the so-called Pruszków Action in whose course he was badly injured.

scholarly journals WWII VICISSITUDES OF THE INSIGNIA OF KING AUGUSTUS III

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 62 ◽  
pp. 132-142
Author(s):  
Jarosław Robert Kudelski
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Regime ◽  
National Museum ◽  
Cultural Goods ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Ww Ii ◽  
Art Works ◽  
General Government ◽  
Maria Josepha ◽  
Private Collections

During WW II, numerous precious art works from Polish public and private collections were looted, displaced and taken out of Poland. In view of the value of some of those pieces, the invaders’ authorities decided to have them transferred to German museums, and this is what happened to the coronation insignia of King Augustus III and his spouse Maria Josepha. German officials took over the regalia which were property of the National Museum in Warsaw already in 1939. Some time after, they were transferred to Cracow, the capital of the General Government. Several months later the insignia returned to Warsaw. In 1941, Dr Hans Lammers, Chief of the Reich Chancellery, requested them. On Adolf Hitler’s decision they were to be transferred to Dresden’s Grünes Gewölbe; in order to be transported there they were taken from Warsaw in 1942. By the end of the war, they were evacuated to a repository of artworks in the cellars of the Königstein Fortress. After WW II had ended, they were relocated, together with other cultural goods, to Moscow. It was only in 1960 that the Soviet regime returned the precious regalia to Poland.

scholarly journals CURATORSHIP PRAXISES TOWARDS ‘DISPLACED ASSETS’ IN POST-1989 MUSEUM PROJECTS: TWO EXHIBITIONS AT WARSAW’S XAWERY DUNIKOWSKI MUSEUM

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 208-218
Author(s):  
Ewa Toniak
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Major Part ◽  
National Museum ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Museum Exhibits ◽  
Methodological Basis ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Provenance Research

Two exhibitions at the Xawery Dunikowski Museum of Sculpture at the Królikarnia Palace, branch of the National Museum in Warsaw: the ‘Inventorying’ Display-Research Project, which was a kind of a public inventory of the sculpture collection (2012) and the Exhibition ‘The Estate. Sculptures from the collection of the Von Rose family and films and photographs from the archive of Zofia Chomętowska’ (2015) are case studies serving the Author to analyse curatorship practices with respect to the collections whose major part is composed of ‘displaced assets’, first of all from the so-called ‘Regained Territories’. In the words of the Chief Curator at the Królikarnia Museum since 2011 and the Exhibitions’ Curator Agnieszka Tarasiuk: it is a troublesome collection testifying to a difficult heritage and not yielding to conservation. The paper’s methodological basis is the museum exhibits’ provenance research conducted by R. Olkowski, L.M. Kamińska, and M. Romanowska-Zadrożna, while its context is found in the programme assumptions of the Strategy for the Operations and Development of the National Museum in Warsaw 2010–2020 worked out by the former National Museum’s Director Piotr Piotrowski. One of its priorities is to clarify the origins of the collections of unknown provenance, and settling accounts with their former owners. Furthermore, the question related to constructing museum’s genealogy and the memory of history of the period immediately following WWII in the new socio-political situation in Poland after 1989 is posed. The position for dealing with collections’ provenance research introduced by P. Piotrowski was liquidated following the Director’s dismissal in 2012. The paper forms part of a bigger whole.

Three Essays on Jewish Education during the Nazi Occupation

2000 ◽  
pp. 147-162
Author(s):  
Marian Małowist
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Jewish Education ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Warsaw Ghetto ◽  
Nazi Occupation ◽  
The Times ◽  
Jewish Youth ◽  
Second World ◽  
Spiritual Attitude

This chapter presents three essays on Jewish education during the Nazi occupation. The first essay, entitled ‘The Spiritual Attitude of Jewish Youth in the Period before the Second World War and in the Ghetto’, discusses Jewish youth and its spiritual attitude in the pre-war period and during the war. The outbreak of war, with the traumatic bombing of Warsaw and the occupation, greatly affected the young people; they were spiritually completely unprepared for the hardships of the times. The second essay, entitled ‘Jewish High Schools in Warsaw during the War’, describes in general outlines the education of young people during the war. The third essay, entitled ‘Teaching Jewish Youth in the Warsaw Ghetto during the War, 1939–1941’, looks at the situation of Jewish secondary education during the Second World War.

“L’Affaire Glozel”

Antiquity ◽  
1927 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
O. G. S. Crawford
Keyword(s):  
National Museum ◽  
Neolithic Culture ◽  
The Times ◽  
Very High

On 27 September 1926 the learned world was startled by a letter from Monsieur Salomon Reinach, published in The Times. The writer expressed the opinion that the Palaeolithic period (the last phase of which is represented in France by La Madelaine) might have lasted up to 5000 B.C. M. Reinach is Director of the National Museum of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, near Paris; his reputation as a savant stands very high, and he is listened to with respect. The discoveries which prompted him to express this unorthodox opinion were, he says “ascertained last summer at Glozel near Vichy. In the same stratum, no doubt a deposit of a religious character, have been found—(1) objects akin to the Neolithic culture of the Aegean, one of them being an idol in the shape of a violin; (2) inscriptions closely related to those found in 1894 in an early Portuguese dolmen; (3) numerous engravings of animals on pebbles, the style of which is degenerate Magdalenian. As the objects classified under (1) and (2) date from about 4000–3500, degenerate Magdalenian outlines (3) cannot possibly be earlier, and we thus have a proof, which I think is conclusive, that the Magdalenian should be dated about 5000 B.C.” Thus from the outset the discussion of the issues has been confused by questionable fact and faulty inference.

scholarly journals CATALOGUES OF ENGRAVINGS – ITALIAN ONES FROM THE NATIONAL MUSEUM IN WROCŁAW AND FRENCH ONES FROM THE NATIONAL MUSEUM IN SZCZECIN

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 59 ◽  
pp. 93-97
Author(s):  
Justyna Guze
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
National Museum ◽  
World War ◽  
Alphabetical Order ◽  
Original Works ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Times ◽  
User Friendly ◽  
The 19Th Century

At the turn of 2017 and 2018, with the date 2017 printed in the colophon, two catalogues of engravings’ collections were published: old Italian prints from the collection of the National Museum in Wrocław, and French prints from the National Museum in Szczecin. The collection of Wrocław contains groups of artworks by the best Italian engravers from the Renaissance to the 18th century, and a small representation of the 19th century. An introduction to the catalogue gives the history, the scope and the contents of the collection as well as the brief history of the engraving art on the Apennine Peninsula. The catalogue itself is glossed, giving references to the latest research, preceded by biographical notes of encyclopaedic character. This well illustrated and thoroughly edited catalogue, organised in a user-friendly alphabetical order, is a compendium useful not only for art historians. The catalogue published by the National Museum in Szczecin has the same title as the exhibition of French engravings from its collection. It is a combination of both the exhibition and the collection catalogue. Hence its specific layout corresponding rather with the narration of an exhibition than a catalogue’s criteria. Both the encyclopaedic profiles of artists and the following glosses are accompanied by selected bibliography; its full version together with extensive academic references can be found at the end of the volume. The collection of over 600 prints has been divided not in alphabetical or chronological order but in accordance with an academic hierarchy of subjects. Engravings for art reproduction purposes prevail in Szczecin collection although original works of famous artists are also included. The publication of both catalogues allows us to learn more about the engravings in Polish public collections, i.e. the ones of national museum in Szczecin and Wrocław. It also gives the history of Polish collections after 1945, affected by the previous losses of the World War II. Undoubtedly, the sign of the times and the presence of Poland in the united Europe is the publication of the Italian engravings’ collection from Wrocław, which was kept before in the Academy of Arts in Berlin. Great care has been taken to prepare both catalogues in terms of their typography, although the illustrations in the French engravings’ catalogue would be of more benefit if were somewhat larger.

scholarly journals WILANÓW WORKS OF ART IN THE GERMAN CATALOGUE SICHERGESTELLTE KUNSTWERKE IM GENERALGOUVERNEMENT

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 60 ◽  
pp. 189-198
Author(s):  
Jarosław Robert Kudelski
Keyword(s):  
Married Couple ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Cultural Goods ◽  
German Occupation ◽  
Ww Ii ◽  
Private Collection ◽  
Art Works ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Charles Le Brun ◽  
Lower Silesia

Before the outbreak of WW II, the works of world art collected at the Wilanów Palace were considered to be the largest private collection in the Polish territories. Just the very collection of painting featured 1.200 exhibits. Apart from them the Wilanów collection contained historic furniture, old coins, textiles, artistic craftsmanship items, drawings, and prints, pottery, glassware, silverware, bronzes, sculptures, as well as mementoes of Polish rulers. Already in the first weeks of the German occupation, assigned officials selected the most precious art works from the Wilanów collections, and included them in the Sichergestellte Kunstwerke im Generalgouvernement Catalogue. The publication presented the most precious cultural goods secured by the Germans in the territory of occupied Poland. It included 76 items: 29 paintings and 47 artistic craftsmanship objects. In 1943, the majority of the works included in the quoted Catalogue were transferred to Cracow. A year later, the most valuable exhibits from Wilanów were evacuated to Lower Silesia. What remained in Cracow was only a part of the collection relocated from Wilanów. The chaos of the last weeks preceding the fall of the Third Reich caused that many art works from the Wilanów collection are considered war losses. Among many objects, included in the above Catalogue, there are several Wilanów paintings: Portrait of a Man by Bartholomeus van der Helst, Portrait of a Married Couple by Pieter Nason, Allegory of Architecture, Painting, and Sculpture by Pompeo Batoni, Allegorical Scene in Landscape by Paris Bordone, and The Assumption of Mary by Charles Le Brun.

scholarly journals AMENDMENTS TO THE ACT ON MUSEUMS

Muzealnictwo ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 59 ◽  
pp. 34-38
Author(s):  
Rafał Golat
Keyword(s):  
Public Sector ◽  
Museum Collection ◽  
Access To Information ◽  
Cultural Goods ◽  
Museum Exhibits ◽  
Museum Professionals ◽  
Public Sector Information ◽  
Customer Services ◽  
Memorial Sites

The Act of 21 November 1996 on museums, which has been in force for over 20 years (Journal of Laws of 2017, item 972, as amended), has been amended dozen or more times. Seven of these amendments entered into force in the last two years (2016–2017). They were to a large extent of adjustment character, and concerned inter alia the competence requirements for museum professionals (Journal of Laws of 2017, item 60), removals of museum exhibits from museum inventory (Journal of Laws of 2016, item 1330, and of 2017, item 1086) and the Council of Museums being replaced by the Council of Museums and Memorial Sites (Journal of Laws of 2016, item 749). Amendments concerning the admission charges in museums were of systemic character (Journal of Laws of 2017, item 132) as well as the restitution amendments introduced in Article 57 of the Act of 25 May 2017 on restitution of the national cultural goods, including a new penal provision added to the Act on museums (Art. 34.a in a new chapter 5.a – Journal of Laws of 2017, item 1086). Apart from amendments described in this article, others ought to be mentioned – related to an informative aspect. In this context, the amendments to the Act on museums being in force since 16 June 2016, provided for in Article 29 of the Act of 25 February 2016 on the re-use of public sector information (Journal of Laws of 2016, item 352, as amended) are of great significance. References to this Act can be found in section 4 of Art. 25 and section 4 of Art. 25.a of the Act on museums, added by this amendment, which regulate introducing and charging fees for museum exhibits being prepared and made accessible for different from usual purposes, and for permitting to use their images. Article 31.a of the Act on museums added by this amendment has been repealed by the Art. 34 of the Act of 10 June 2016 on delegating customer services to employees (Journal of Laws of 2017, item 132). The latter Act added Article 30.a of the Act on museums, related in its contents to this regulation. It states that the access to information for safeguarding museum exhibits is limited for the sake of protection from fire, theft and other type of danger which could bring damage or loss of the museum collection.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document