The Kraków Chamber – the Discreet Charm of Reconstruction
behind the scenes of the oldest exhibition housed in the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków
A peasants' cottage in the centre of Kraków's Kazimierz district?
You only have to enter one of the rooms on the ground floor of the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków and let yourself be drawn into a journey through time and space.
Where will it actually lead us?
The Old Kazimierz Town Hall at 1 Wolnica Square seen From the South (1948/1962) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Let's say a time machine takes us back to 1948. This is when the Museum gains a new seat in the building of the former Kazimierz Hall at Wolnica Square (before 1939 it was located at the Wawel Castle).
It's a time of post-war reconstruction. Also for the Museum and its safeguarded collections.
The new building has to be renovated from the ground up. And even rebuilt – until recently, holding cells of the local police station occupied half of the ground floor.
Kraków Bronowice cottage (1901) by Antoni Procajłowicz (1876–1949); team of carpenters working under Włodzimierz Tetmajer The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Thanks to the great commitment of the staff, the Museum opens to the public in 1951, just in time for its 40th anniversary.
“The Ethnographic Museum is different. (…) Somehow very non-museum-like. One has the impression of visiting – rather than a touring it”. – the Tygodnik Powszechny newspaper comments.
Kraków Chamber Kraków Chamber (1951) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
This is because the first post-war exhibition invites its guests to the village houses and workshops arranged in the Renaissance town hall building. They were recreated with the help of artists and builders brought in from outside Kraków.
Rozalia Zaród (1951) The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
The walls and wooden ceiling in the highlander chamber are built by carpenters from Ochotnica Górna – Stanisław Giblak and Andrzej Plewa (they will also help to fit the fulling and oil mills into the museum's interior).
The ceiling and stove in the Kraków chamber are decorated by Rozalia Zaród from Kłyż.
Folk painting (1928) by Rozalia Barańska The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Museum workers ask her to paint the patterns in the same way she does in her own home. Kłyż is one of the villages in Powiśle Dąbrowskie, famous for its traditional floral wall decorations.
Ceiling in Kraków chamber at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
118 floral motifs are created – each one is different.
Stove - fragment of the exhibition at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Supposedly, Rozalia Zaród uses cow milk to make up the paint.
The smell of dairy products is therefore lingering in the exhibition long after it has been opened, further adding to the feeling of authenticity.
Kraków Chamber The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Only that in the Museum we are not dealing with the recreation of a specific, living space. It's a model based on ethnographic knowledge and cognitive enthusiasm.
Interior of a Kraków chamber Interior of a Kraków chamber (1899) by Włodzimierz Tetmajer The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Just like in Włodzimierz Tetmajer's drawing from 1899.
Are we going back in time a few more decades? Yes!
Building of the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków at the Royal Wawel Castle (1915) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Tetmajer – an artist, social activist, and politician – was a member of the Founding Committee of the Society for the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków. It leads to the establishment of the institution in 1911.
Seweryn Udziela plays first fiddle in this community of people fascinated by native folklore and committed to preserving the disappearing traces of local culture.
Kraków Chamber The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
This is what Udziela writes in 1924 about the interior design of the peasant cottage from Kraków area: “What is striking about the room is above all the array of pictures of saints placed (…) along the entire wall under the ceiling, the table, the bench, the chest, the stools, the crockery cupboard…
and the beds, all painted in flowers. (…) Beds made with tall pillows and duvets (…) next to a cradle, also painted”.
Bed and stool in the Kraków chamber (1926) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Udziela is the first director of the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków. And the painted furniture (from the furniture centre in Skawina) was one of the Museum's first orders. You can see them in the photographs of the MEK exhibition at the Wawel Castle (here in 1926).
Kraków Chamber – exhibition fragment at the Wołodkowicz Palace (1939) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
And at the Wołodkowicz Palace, where the museum had opened its branch – Museum of the Land of Kraków – two months before the outbreak of World War II.
Fragment of the Kraków chamber (1939) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
It would be allowed to operate only until early September of 1939.
Table – fragment of the Kraków chamber at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków (unknown) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
The idea of reconstructing a rural interior would survive, as we can see, much longer.
It will be revisited by the creators of the post-war exhibition.
The story of the Kraków countryside presented here has to be, above all, beautiful.
Rural culture is to be admired.
Stove - fragment of the exhibition at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
There are no signs of food preparation on the oven, only a set of useful tools.
Kitchen stove (1913) by Eugeniusz Frankowski The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
And yet a real oven means fire, smoke, and soot. For this reason, the part of the room where it was located was called the black room.
It was there, rather than in the “white” area of the house, that a family's life concentrated.
Cradle – fragment of the exhibition at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
The duvets piling up on the beds are a pleasing sight, but represent only part of the truth. Not all rural families could afford such a decor.
The reconstruction remains faithful not so much to reality as to the image of a prosperous, festive peasant cottage.
Kraków Chamber The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
It takes us on a journey through the Museum's history, rather than introducing us to the reality of life in a village near Kraków.
Today, however, after more than half a century, this arrangement is special in itself. It's like a museum inside a museum.
Dowry chest – fragment of the Kraków chamber at the Ethnographic Museum of Kraków The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
Children and adults love its colourful décor and mysterious atmosphere. And then there's the moody creaking floor…
Rozalia Zaród's brushes - fragment of the Kraków Chamber in the Ethnographic Museum in Kraków (1951) by unknown The Ethnographic Museum in Kraków
And authenticity?
The paintbrushes Rozalia Zaród used to decorate the interior of the chamber lay on the oven to this day.
It all really happened!
Text: Dorota Majkowska-Szajer
Designed and created by: Natalia Ciemborowicz-Luber, Dorota Majkowska-Szajer, Katarzyna Piszczkiewicz
