EXHIBITION 'OUR BALTIC NEIGHBOURHOOD'
From May 15th to June 30th, the forth exhibition in the series Our Neighbours - A New Perspective, organized in cooperation with The Danish Institute of Cultural, was presented in the National Library in Warsaw. The exhibition presented reception of 5 Scandinavian countries: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden in the Polish culture. The director of the Institute was the curator of the exhibition.
The idea of the series of the exhibitions is to show the impressions of Poles on various aspects of cultures of the countries neighbouring Poland, mainly on the basis of literature. The exhibition Our Baltic Neihghbourhood also presented examples of the cultural impact of Poland's neighbours from the North: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden, also within other fields, such as theatre, film, architecture, sport, design and language. The poster from the exhibition Our Baltic Neighbourhood was designed by Miroslaw Pawlowski.
It is clear, however, that books and articles dominated the exhibition. Starting with the earliest notes in Medieval chronicles, through old and new travelogues, memoirs and historical works, one could also trace theatre posters and elements of scenography to screenplays based on H.C.Andersen's fairy-tales.
A separate part of the exhibition presented numerous issues of the fairy-tales by this famous Danish writer, who for 150 years has accompanied generations of Poles in their childhood. Children could play here with Lego bricks or watch Muminki on video films.
There were also some rarities on the exhibition, eg. the first issue of poetry by Jan Kochanowski from the 16th century including the poem written in memory of Jan Teczynski and his love to the Swedish queen Cecilia, a 14th century book with the Revelations of Sweden's St. Bridget's, documents and copperplates from the 16th century, as well as paintings by Wojciech Weiss. A careful study of the exhibition allowed one to trace main tendencies and events in the Polish culture's reception of its neighbours from the North. The spectators could not find any division into the 5 Scandinavian countries at the exhibition, with which contacts and impact were different. It is, however, possible to mark boarders of that influence or to show the proportions: The result would be that Sweden is most broadly reflected in Polish culture, Denmark would rank second place, then Norway and Finland - countries that appeared in the minds of Poles as separate cultural entities not until the 19th century. And finally Iceland - still appearing as a far and exotic island with mysterious nature, mainly associated with sagas and ... geysers. This, however, does not change the fact that even if someone knows well only one of the Scandinavian countries, one extends - often unconsciously - this knowledge to the whole Scandinavia. Thus, we often say "the Scandinavians this, the Scandinavians that ..". The exhibition also demonstrated the important activity of cultural institutions of the Pomeranian cities, mainly the Baltic Cultural Centre in Gdansk, the Pomeranian Princes' Castle, Klub 13 Muz and the "Amfilada" Gallery in Szczecin, supported by the local monthlies Pogranicza and Tytul, as well as by local authorities. It was also in Szczecin where appeared the idea of creating a periodical Mare Articum dedicated to the art of the Baltic Countries, where critics from these countries publish their articles. So, Mare Balticum, the bone of contention and causa belli in past centuries, has become renamed by the enthusiasts of neighbourly relations to Mare Articum. Thus, the 20th century brought a change in the perception of the Baltic Sea from a sea that divides into a sea that joins - mainly through culture. The perception of the Scandinavian countries as neighbours characterises the current generations of Poles, and specially the period of the last ten years. That new attitude provides good capital for future. The exhibition Our Baltic Neighbourhood was open till June 30th.