A board exhibition with art objects introducing the work of artists active in the War Graves Department in Krakow (Kriegsgräberabteilung Krakau, abbreviation: KGA). In 1915–1918, the group was responsible for arranging the space of the former battlefields and the construction of cemeteries primarily in the area of Western Galicia. Over 40 individuals collaborated with the Department – architects, painters, sculptors, graphic designers, and photographers from various countries of the monarchy.

The exhibition presents the work process of the Department. It showcases original plans, topographic maps, numerous photographs – including those previously unpublished – from the time when the cemeteries were designed, as well as original surviving artifacts: sculptures, tombstones, and works of art obtained during the renovation of cemeteries.

An important objective of this exhibition is to revive the interest in the work of artists who worked for the Department – famous artists such as Dušan Jurkovič, Henryk Uziembło or Alfons Karpiński, but also those less known, discovered only in the last decade. The second group includes, among others, Hans Mayr, Gustaw Ludwig, and Heinrich Scholz.

On display are works addressing the military and everyday issues, including sketches documenting the life in the barracks, landscapes, battlefields, temporary burial sites, genre sketches, leaflets, and medals. Among particularly interesting exhibits are gouaches and watercolours with the views of Krakow and Galicia by the Viennese landscape painter Franz Poledny, etchings by Robert Pochop, Reinhold Völkel’s watercolours with views of war cemeteries, and Henryk Uziembło’s oil and watercolour sketches to the now lost panorama “Gorlice 1915”.

The display boards and artworks are supplemented with one more important element – the first edition of the work “Die Westgalizischen Heldengräber aus den Jahren des Weltkrieges 1914–1915” [The West Galician heroes’ graves from the years of the World War 1914–1915] by Rudolf Broch and Hans Hauptmann, summarising the Department’s activity.

In the exhibition, the focus on the artistic aspect of the work of the War Graves Department in Krakow comes together with the emphasis on the postwar history of the cemeteries. Many of these sites have been destroyed. Those that survived are now included in the Lesser Poland part of the “Trail of the Eastern Front of World War I”.

The exhibition has been organised in cooperation with Małopolska Provincial Office in Kraków.

The exhibits presented in the object-based part come mainly from private collections, and together with the board part also from the National Archives in Krakow, the Slovak National Archives in Bratislava, the National Museum in Krakow, the Museum of Krakow, the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw, the Alfons Karpiński Painting Gallery in Stalowa Wola, the Stanisław Fischer Museum in Bochnia, the Regional Museum in Rzeszów, the Regional Museum of the Polish Tourist and Sightseeing Society in Gorlice.

Curators

dr Agnieszka Partridge

Exhibition Curator

dr Beata Nykiel

ICC Curator

Curators

dr Agnieszka Partridge

Exhibition Curator

Journalist, publicist, and art historian. Doctor of Technical Sciences from the Faculty of Architecture of the Cracow University of Technology. Member of, among others, PKN ICOMOS, the Society of Enthusiasts of Krakow History and Monuments, “Crux Galicjae,” the Association of Polish Journalists, the Association of Polish Filmmakers, and the Association of Art Historians. Author of the album monograph “Open the Gates of Memory. War Cemeteries from 1914–1918 in Małopolska” (together with photographer Rafał Korzeniowski).

dr Beata Nykiel

ICC Curator

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