This local club is for readers who would like to discuss Polish literature in English. The book for the meeting is Tango by Sławomir Mrożek, first published in 2006. Tango is a play, and arguably, his most famous one. In his trademark absurd style the play deals with the totalitarianism and its brutal ways of forcing conformism; the subject treatment through the fog of absurd makes for a different and interesting perspective. Mrożek (1930-2013) is
Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute New York presents Kino Polska: New Polish Cinema, bringing together the best new works from Poland’s boundary-pushing filmmakers. The series, starting on Friday, April 30 through Thursday, May 6, features seven films, including the New York premiere of the Venice Film Festival hit Never Gonna Snow Again / Śniegu już nigdy nie będzie (2020, 113′). Director Malgorzata Szumowska (whose Berlinale prizewinner Mug screened in the 2018 iteration
Roy “Wojtek” Koczarski, a long time active member of the Polish community, and notably the architect taking care of the Polish Home, died on April 26, 2021 of natural causes with his family by his side. He was 92. Wojciech Koczarski was born on February 7, 1929 in Lwów, then a major city in Poland, now Lviv in Ukraine, as a son of Zofia and Roman Koczarski. At 14, conscripted by the Nazi Germany to
The Kosciuszko Foundation online programs presents a meet-the-author talk Barbara & Augustus – A Renaissance Love Story and the Upheaval It Caused by Jeffrey Prince. He will talk about his recently completed manuscript In the Matter of the King’s Marriage, which brings the Golden Age of Poland to life for an American audience. The Renaissance in Poland generated fascinating tales of love and intrigue that have been retold and reinterpreted in each succeeding age—but almost always
This event was rescheduled from February 10, 2021. The UW Henry Jackson School of International Studies presents a lecture Anti-Gender Politics And Right-Wing Populism in Poland by Elżbieta Korolczuk. Dr. Korolczuk is an Associate Professor of sociology at the Södertörn University in Stockholm and American Studies Center at Warsaw University. The European Union has set impressive standards on gender equality, providing legal frameworks for equal pay, investing in work/life balance and childcare, and allowing for
The UW Polish Studies Endowment Committee presents the lecture Katarzyna Kobro Composing Space by Marek Wieczorek. Dr. Wieczorek is Associate Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art History at the University of Washington in Seattle, specializing in early 20th- century avant-garde art with focus on abstraction. Katarzyna Kobro (1898-1951) was an abstract sculptor who studied with and was influenced by Kazimir Malevich and was active in Poland in the 1920s and 1930s. Known for her radical
The book for the meeting is Głos, a book-long interview with Wojciech Mann by Katarzyna Kubisiowska, published by Znak in 2020. Mann, a radio & TV host, is a household name in Poland and known to everybody due to his very popular music programs in Polish Radio hosted for over fifty years. One topic covered by the book is Mann’s desire to defend his independence and his departure from the public radio forced by the
Barbara and Marian Strutynski have just retired from an active involvement at the Polish Home after being pillars of the Polish community for over five decades. Barbara started the children folk dance group Young Polanie / Młodzi Polanie in the 1960s and that in due course spawned a children theater group called Teatrzyk Biedronka (Ladybug Theatre). The dance group has been active until the pandemic put it on hold, while the last children theatre performance
Anna Kulakowska has launched a new initiative at the Polish Cultural Center with an audacious goal to start a theatre! Together with Paulina Phung, she is organizing a theatrical group and calling on all theatre enthusiasts – actors, makeup artists, set designers, script writers and more to get in touch.There is a history of a children theatre, a cabaret group and even an adult theatre at the Polish Hall in Seattle. However, it has been a decade
The Polish American Historical Association (PAHA) presents a webinar A Builder of Polish American Identity: How Victor Cordella of Krakow Shaped Church Architecture in Minnesota by Geoffrey Gyrisco, Mark Dillon, and Michael Retka. They will share their research on the Polish-American architect whose churches can be found across Minnesota. The project and its authors have received the 2019 Skalny Award. More: PAHA website This is a free webinar available to the public; to register click
The We Are The History Keepers! workshop on preserving history, both for families and organizations, runs in 2-hour monthly sessions, each tackling a single topics. These are all online interactive sessions on a Saturday before noon. This is the fourth session in the series. The organizers describe content of this session, Caring for and Digitizing Legacy Audio-Visual Materials, as follows: Discover resources that local libraries, historic organizations and museums hold that can give context and
The Kosciuszko Foundation Online Programs presents a concert from the Quarantine Jazz series with cellist Krzysztof Lenczowski. Lenczowski, as a member of his own bands, as well as a session musician, recorded over 50 albums, including two original albums – “Internal Melody” (the first Polish jazz record signed with the cellist’s name, which in 2016 was awarded Fryderyk in the “Jazz Phonographic Debut of the Year” category), and “Rzeczy osobiste” (released in July 2018, the
The Kosciuszko Foundation online programs present a lecture I Got Imprisoned For Rock & Roll: Andrzej Stasiuk and the Literature of Periphery by Dr. Krzysztof Gajewski. Andrzej Stasiuk (b. 1960) is one of the most renowned Polish writers of the turn of 20 and 21 centuries. In his case, biography is intermingled with the artistic creation and almost inseparable from it. He calls himself a child of communism and American pop-culture. Stasiuk’s prose’s point of
The Consulate General of Poland in Los Angeles does not plan a passport visit to Seattle before or during summer 2021; the program to visit different cities has been suspended since spring 2020. A consular visit in the fall is a possibility, but it’s not decided yet – it would come to pass only if the pandemic situation improved further and it was safe to travel for the consular staff. Hence, for the next several
Around 5:20 pm on April 7, 2021, there was a fire at the house adjacent to the Polish Home building from south, and unfortunately a life was lost. The elderly neighbor Michael Gross has perished and his body was found by the firefighters. He was 70 years old. The initial investigation indicates that the fire was accidental, most likely caused by a portable space heater. There was no damage to the Polish Cultural Center building,
The following is a quote from the King County Public Health mail received on April 7, 2021. Hello, I want to let you know that there is high availability of appointments for the Johnson & Johnson one dose vaccine at the Public Health – Seattle King County Auburn vaccination site for today, April 7 through Monday, April 12. The site is located at the Auburn Outlet Collection. Below is a message you can share with
The Kosciuszko Foundation online programs present a webinar in the Polish Contemporary Literature series Touched by History: Politics and Poetics of the Polish New Wave Writers in the 1970s. In the late 1960s a new poetic formation emerged in Poland, known as “New Wave” or “Generation 1968”. The notable poets included Adam Zagajewski, Stanislaw Baranczak, Ryszard Krynicki, and Ewa Lipska. In the second lecture devoted to athe “New Wave” poets, Jaroslaw Anders continues to discuss
The 2021 Seattle International Film Festival is all virtual. This year, only one Polish feature movie is in the program; it is Sweat directed by Magnus von Horn and starring Magdalena Koleśnik. This 2020 movie was featured at the Cannes Film Festival, among others. The film recounts three days in the life of a fitness guru and social media celebrity Sylwia Zając. Sweat starts out light, pink, and fluffy and then turns into a high-energy
Polish Festival Seattle will have a livestream video on the Festival day, July 10, 2021 showcasing traditional Polish costumes along with dance, music and other activities. We invite members of the Seattle Polish community and also our PNW neighbors to submit short videos that go along with this summer’s costume theme or just show off your being Polish! So don your favorite Polish folk costume, a noble / szlachta costume or a magnate costume sparkling
The University of Washington has its yearly fundraiser on April 8, 2021 and is appealing to donors to support their favorite UW programs. If you are Polish and want to donate to the University of Washington, please support the UW Polish Studies Endowment Committee (UW PSEC). More: UW PSEC website, and its donation page