Polish-Jewish Artists
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REMEMBRANCE, RECONSTRUCTION, RESTITUTION: EXHIBITING RESCUED WORKS OF POLISH AND OLISH EWISH RTISTS P -J A (1945-1949) By Jakub Gawkowski Submitted to Central European University Department of History In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Supervisor: Professor Marsha Siefert Second Reader: Professor Carsten Wilke CEU eTD Collection Budapest, Hungary June 2019 Copyright notice Copyright in the text of this thesis rests with the Author. Copies by any process, either in full or in part, may be made only in accordance with the instructions given by the Author and lodged in the Central European Library. Details may be obtained from the librarian. This page must form a part of any such copies made. Further copies made in accordance with such instructions may not be made without the written permission of the Author. CEU eTD Collection i ABSTRACT This thesis explores how, in the aftermath of World War II in Poland, artworks were personified as victims and displayed to signify the destruction of national culture. The thesis focuses on two exhibitions: Warsaw Accuses in the National Museum in Warsaw in 1945, and on the traveling exhibition Rescued Works of Jewish Artists, organized by the Jewish Society for Encouragement of Fine Arts in 1949. Examining two cases, I explore the themes of remembrance, cultural reconstruction and art restitution in regard to Polish and Polish-Jewish culture in the immediate post-war period. The analysis of exhibitions has two main layers. Firstly, I analyze their social and political context. Secondly, I focus on the social biographies of displayed artworks to reveal how different meanings were ascribed to them after the war, and the ways in which they were reinterpreted. I identify two methods of art restitution—one carried out “from above” by the state institutions, and one “from below” by the Jewish organization—to argue that after the war the urge to preserve the past became a crucial issue not only in relation to lost human beings, but also material heritage. My object-oriented approach reveals ways in which the Polish and Polish-Jewish culture was reconstructed and perpetuated between 1945 and 1949. I show how the discussed displays of “rescued” artworks, which I consider the prototypes of restitution exhibitions, were expressions of the post-war construction of collective victimhood. My analysis shows the important place CEU eTD Collection of national culture in post-war Poland and traces the attempts to reconstruct Jewish culture and to create a new Jewish identity in the ethnically homogeneous communist state. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thanks and acknowledgements are due to a number of people, whom I was very fortunate to meet and receive help from in the course of writing this thesis. First and foremost, I would like to thank my supervisor, professor Marsha Siefert for her kindness, enthusiasm, patient guidance and for the innumerable number of priceless advices during the last two years. I would also like to thank my second reader, professor Carsten Wilke, whose courses and comments significantly broadened my academic perspectives. No less importantly, I need to thank the coordinators Agnes Bendik and Aniko Molnar for being a great help in going through the academic system. Completing this work would have been all the more difficult were it not for the support and friendship provided by the fellow students of the History Department. I am grateful to my dear friends Ivana Žimbrek, Ivanka Pruchová, and Jan Charvát, whose company and many inspiring conversations made my stay here enjoyable. I am indebted to many people, with whom I was able to discuss my work during seminars at CEU and outside of it. I would like to thank Kornelia Kończal and Ewa Stańczyk for providing me a chance to discuss my research in stimulating workshop environment, and to professor Jacek Leociak for the encouragement and inspiration. Another special debt is owed to the persons who helped me to access archival documents, including professor Alina Kowalczykowa and Jakub Bendkowski. I owe my greatest debt to my parents and to Patryk for the support I receive every day. CEU eTD Collection iii Table of contents ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................................................................................iii Table of contents ....................................................................................................................... iv List of Figures ............................................................................................................................ v Introduction: living people and dead objects ............................................................................. 1 Approach to the subject ......................................................................................................... 3 Thesis structure .................................................................................................................... 14 1. Remembrance, Reconstruction, Restitution, 1945-1949 ................................................. 16 1.1 War and the fight for memory ....................................................................................... 16 1.2 “Rescued art:” two kinds of restitution .......................................................................... 30 1.3 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 38 2. Warsaw Accuses (1945) ....................................................................................................... 39 2.1 National Museum in the city returned from obliteration. .............................................. 39 2.2 Mission of the exhibition ............................................................................................... 42 2.3 Destruction on display ................................................................................................... 46 2.4 Reception and editions outside of Warsaw .................................................................... 56 2.5 Jewish Warsaw Accuses ................................................................................................ 59 2.6 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 64 3. Rescued Works of Jewish Artists (1949) .............................................................................. 66 3.1 The Jewish Society for the Encouragement of Fine Arts .............................................. 66 3.2 Jewish Art in Polish Lower Silesia ................................................................................ 69 3.3 Exhibited art, its provenance and identity...................................................................... 77 3.4 Reception and audience ................................................................................................. 87 3.5 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 93 Conclusion: dead people and living objects............................................................................. 94 Bibliography .......................................................................................................................... 107 CEU eTD Collection iv List of Figures Figure 1. National Museum in Warsaw after the war. ............................................................. 19 Figure 2. Józef Sandel and Ernestyna Podhorizer. .................................................................. 24 Figure 3 Truck with recovered art in front of the Museum. .................................................... 28 Figure 4. Recovered chests presented in the hall of National Museum ................................... 28 Figure 5. Restitution mission in Lower Silesia. ....................................................................... 29 Figure 6. Restitution mission on the way................................................................................. 29 Figure 7. Display in the Documentation Room. ...................................................................... 45 Figure 8. Matejko’s painting in the the Museum Room. ......................................................... 47 Figure 9. Destruction Room. .................................................................................................... 48 Figure 10. Display in the Destruction Room. .......................................................................... 49 Figure 11. Damaged paintings in the Destruction Room. ........................................................ 53 Figure 12. Head of Adam Mickiewicz’s statue. ...................................................................... 56 Figure 13. Dwight D. Eisenhower visiting the museum. ......................................................... 58 Figure 14. Poster of Warsaw Accuses. .................................................................................... 61 Figure 15. The Works of Jewish Artist Martyrs of the German Occupation of 1939–1945. .. 67 Figure 16. Works of Jewish Martyrs, Catalogue Cover........................................................... 67 Figure 17. Rescued Works of Jewish Artists – catalogue ........................................................ 74 Figure 18. Lea Grundig, Ernestyna Podhorizer, Józef