On Sunday, 21 March 2021, the great Polish poet Adam Zagajewski passed away. In his poetic heyday, he would write poems critics called ‘classicising’, showing the world’s hidden beauty as well as emphasising the mysteriousness and uniqueness of human fate. And still, for a poet who defended the categories of beauty, mindfulness and detail, he…
With the end of Communism in Poland, a new era in Polish-Israeli relations began. The first element of change was seen in May 1990 with the beginning of the joint operation “Bridge” which established a humanitarian corridor for Jews emigrating from the Soviet Union. All thanks to the bold decision of Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki,…
14 June 1940 the first mass transport to the German Concentration Camp in Auschwitz took place. The vast majority of the 728 men were Polish political prisoners. Overall, the group consisted of members of the resistance movement; social and political activists arrested under AB Aktion, Catholic clergy, and a small group of Jews. Every one…
Moving from little Belluno to Venice – was this a necessity for an ambitious painter of the Baroque era? Especially if we take into account the fact that his father was a local painter who used to paint the folds of cloaks worn by saints. Dolabella ended up in the workshop of Antonio Vassilacchi and…
After the coronation of Jagiełło, Jadwiga was still formally King, and not just the wife of the monarch. As she matured, she increasingly often took the initiative in matters of the state and, in the final years of her life, was an independent politician, able to effectively negotiate with neighbours and set them tough conditions….
The universal tendency to reproduce the model created by the Sun King – also discernible in seats of democratic power, the palaces of the mighty, or the individual microcosms imitating the Bourbon inheritance – cannot obscure the long-standing fascination of the Sarmatian world with Versailles. In many cases, we are dealing with the comprehensive assimilation…
