Palmyra Memorial
If someone didn't know what the described museum was about after the first look at its building, he could guess it already. The architecture betrays its function, and the form allows for many interpretations. The rust-whitefacade unmistakably refers to the redand white colors of the national flag, suggesting that the site will be about national memory. Meanwhile, the holes and rips in the rust-colored tin are symbolic representations of gunshot marks.
Palmiry Memorial
photo: Maja Górczak
More than twenty kilometers from Warsaw, among the forests of the Kampinos Forest, is the Palmiry Memorial. More than two thousand victims of German executions of 1939-1943 are buried in the neighboring cemetery. In order to bring the history of these tragic events closer and pay tribute to the fallen, a museum has been established, the very building of which resembles a monument.
Palmiry Memorial
photo: Maja Górczak
The building of the Palmyra Memorial was erected according to the design of architects from the WXCA studio. The studio set itself the goal of creating a space conducive to contemplation. The atmosphere of reverie is enhanced by the placement of the museum in the very center of the forest that was the place of execution of hundreds of Poles. The location in the heart of the forest means that only a few tourists go to the Memorial. However, there is the added value that this moving museum is visited in solitude.
Palmiry Memorial
photo: Maja Górczak
The permanent exhibition presents documents and memorabilia, of people murdered by the Germans during executions in nearby villages, and trees. Trees that bear witness to those inhumanities. With this in mind, it is impossible to be indifferent to the photos showing fragments of the forest from the 1940s when the executions took place. Back then it was more like a grove, today it has grown completely unrecognizable. Nature as a silent witness has been incorporated into the museum space by placing individual birch trees in cylindrical glazing. The impression of being constantly in the forest is heightened by large glass panes on the side of the main entrance that open up a view of the trees and the ecumenical cemetery at Palmiry hidden behind them. The Palmiry Memorial doesn't let you forget that the forest is one of the most important exhibits. After all, it is the last witness that has survived to our time.
Palmiry Memorial Site
photo: Maja Górczak
Katyn Museum
Sometimes architecture must tell the story of what is difficult to describe in words. After all, how to talk about the extermination of at least twenty thousand representatives of the Polish intelligentsia? Polish history has seen events that cannot be told without emotion. And it is these that are most strongly exposed at the Katyn Museum.
The museum is part of the Martyrdom Branch of the Polish Army Museum and is located on the grounds of a citadel dating back to the 19th century. The task of architects from the BBGK studio was to adapt the existing space to new purposes and give it a different emotional expression. Here every detail, even the smallest, is filled with symbolism.
Katyn Museum
photo: Maja Górczak
Design and execution at the highest level led to the building being nominated in 2017 for the Mies van der Rohe Prize - the most important award for contemporary architecture in Europe. The nominated buildings have a chance to be recognized as the canon of modern architecture that marks the future in design. An extremely important aspect of this nomination is that the building commemorates a crime condemned to oblivion by the Soviets. In this case, innovative architecture immortalizes the past.
The tour of the Katyn Museum is along the black path, the last road leading through a small forest. The grove commemorates the forests where Polish army and police officers were murdered and buried. The one on the museum grounds is modest and well-kept - the trees grow at even distances, resembling soldiers standing in formation or waiting for a drill.
Katyn Museum
Photo: Maja Górczak
The black path continues to the entrance to the center of the citadel, which houses a permanent exhibition depicting the historical background of the Katyn massacre. While for the Polish visitor it will abound with many intriguing facts and moving witness testimonies, foreign tourists will learn almost nothing. All the charts and captions are in Polish only. Foreign visitors must rent an audio guide. The language handicap prevents the museum from seamlessly fulfilling its most important function, which is to bear witness to a silent history. Provided with English captions are only mementos found in the death pits - items that require no commentary, themselves expressing more than any words. On the other hand, letters of Katyn families, written even up to several years after an officer's death, are only available in Polish in the audios.
Katyn Museum
photo: Maja Górczak
Among the items found are distinctive eagle buttons. Copies of such buttons adorn the entrance door to the main part of the exhibition. There is no shortage of symbolism in another passageway either. The museum consists of two floors, between which an elevator rides - but it is not a traditional, shiny modern elevator, but a cage. The perforations in its walls and black color are reminiscent of a prisoner.
After returning to the exterior of the exhibition, a black path directs visitors through an avenue commemorating all those who were murdered. However, this is not a memorial wall with names, but a series of stone stelae engraved with the name of the profession whose representatives were murdered in Katyn. Only after learning their professions does one reach the place where their names are inscribed. The pavilion also features huge candles and symbols of all the religions professed by the fallen.
The most striking point of the entire museum is the long and claustrophobic staircase, as if carved into a crevice of the citadel's fortifications. The brownish-rusthue of the buildings blends beautifully with the surrounding greenery and somehow calms the aroused emotions. The walls of the crack reflect the contours of objects belonging to Katyn's residents. Holy pictures, eagles, combs - all characterize everyday life and describe who the executed officers were.
Katyn Museum
photo: Maja Górczak
The genius of the Katyn Museum's architecture lies in its fusion with nature and the use of symbols that strongly affect the emotions. The buildings here are hidden underground, just as the truth about Katyn crimes was hidden for years. That's why the staircase is so important in this project, through which one exits the exhibition - leaving the underground and pursuing the truth.
