Museum of the History of Polish Jews

About

POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews (Polish: Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich) is a museum dedicated to preserving and recalling the memory of the history of Jews in Poland. The museum is located on the site of the former Warsaw Ghetto. The Hebrew word Polin in the museum's English name means either "Poland" or "rest here" and relates to a legend about the arrival of the first Jews to Poland. Construction of the museum in designated land in Muranów, Warsaw's prewar Jewish quarter, began in 2009, following an international architectural competition won by Finnish architects Rainer Mahlamäki and Ilmari Lahdelma. Completed at a cost of 320 million zł, the museum opened on 19 April 2013 with the core exhibition, showcasing the thousand-year history of Polish Jews, opening on 28 October 2014. The museum's architecture features a minimalist exterior with glass fins and copper mesh, and an interior designed by Event Communications. A central feature is the cavernous entrance hall, symbolizing the fractured history of Polish Jews. The organizational structure of POLIN includes an academic team led by Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett and chief historian Antony Polonsky.

The idea for creating a major new museum in Warsaw dedicated to the history of Polish Jews was initiated in 1995 by the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland. In the same year, the Warsaw City Council allocated the land for this purpose in Muranów, Warsaw's prewar Jewish quarter and site of the former Warsaw Ghetto, facing the Monument to the Warsaw Ghetto Heroes. In 2005, the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland established a private-public partnership with the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the City of Warsaw. It was formally established in May 2006; its first director was Jerzy Halbersztadt. In September 2006, a specially designed tent called Ohel (the Hebrew word for tent) was erected for exhibitions and events at the site of the museum's future location.

An international architectural competition to design the building was launched in 2005, supported by a grant from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. On 30 June 2005, the winner was announced by the jury as the team of two Finnish architects, Rainer Mahlamäki and Ilmari Lahdelma. On 30 June 2009, construction of the building was officially inaugurated. The project was completed in 33 months at a cost of 150 million zł allocated by the ministry and the city, with a total cost of 320 million zł. It is financially supported by annual funds from the Polish Ministry of Culture and Warsaw City Council.

The building opened and the museum began its educational and cultural programs on 19 April 2013, on the 70th Anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. During the 18 months that followed, more than 180,000 visitors toured the building, visited the first temporary exhibitions, and took part in cultural and educational programs and events, including film screenings, debates, workshops, performances, concerts, and lectures. The Grand Opening, with the completed Core Exhibition, took place on 28 October 2014. The Core Exhibition documents and celebrates the thousand-year history of the Jewish community in Poland that was decimated by the Holocaust.

In 2016 the museum won the European Museum of the Year Award from the European Museum Forum.

Museum faces the Memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

The museum faces the memorial commemorating the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943. The winner of the architectural competition was Rainer Mahlamäki, of the architectural studio 'Lahdelma & Mahlamäki Oy in Helsinki, whose design was chosen from 100 submissions to the international architectural competition. The Polish firm Kuryłowicz & Associates was responsible for construction. The building's minimalist exterior is clad with glass fins and copper mesh. Silk-screened on the glass is the word Polin, in Latin and Hebrew letters.

The central feature of the building is its cavernous entrance hall. The main hall forms a high, undulating wall. The empty space is a symbol of cracks in the history of Polish Jews. Similar in shape to gorge, which could be a reference to the crossing of the Red Sea known from the Exodus. The museum is nearly 13,000 square meters of usable space. At the lowest level, in the basement of the building, will be placed the main exhibition about the history of Jews from the Middle Ages to modern times. The museum building also has a multipurpose auditorium with 480 seats, temporary exhibition rooms, an education center, an information center, a playroom for children, café, shop, and a future kosher restaurant.

Since the museum presents the whole history of Jews in Poland, not only the period under German occupation, the designer wanted to avoid similarities to existing Holocaust museums (such as the Jewish Museum in Berlin and the museum at Yad Vashem ) which had austere concrete structures. The architects kept the museum in the colors of sand, giving it a more approachable feeling.

The interior design was conceived and master-planned by London-based museum design consultancy, Event Communications, along with local firms.

In 2008, the design of the museum was awarded the Chicago Athenaeum International Architecture Award. In 2014, the designer Rainer Mahlamäki was awarded the Finlandia Prize for Architecture for his design of the museum. The same year, the building received the SARP Award of the Year conferred by the Association of Polish Architects.

The Core Exhibition's academic team consists of Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett (Program Director) of New York University, Hanna Zaremska of the Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Adam Teller of Brown University, Igor Kąkolewski of the University of Warmia and Mazury, Marcin Wodziński of the University of Wrocław, Samuel Kassow of Trinity College, Barbara Engelking and Jacek Leociak of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research at the Polish Academy of Sciences, Helena Datner of the Jewish Historical Institute, and Stanisław Krajewski of Warsaw University. Antony Polonsky of Brandeis University is the Core Exhibition's chief historian.

American Friends of POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews is a U.S. based non-profit organization supporting the foundation of the museum.

On 17 June 2009, the museum launched the Virtual Shtetl portal, which collects and provides access to essential information about Jewish life in Poland before and after the Holocaust in Poland. The portal now features more than 1,240 towns with maps, statistics, and image galleries based in large measure on material provided by local history enthusiasts and former residents of those places.

Distinguished Benefactors are a group of individuals and institutions who have supported the museum's programme activities after the Museum of the History of Polish Jews' founding campaign, which was conducted between 1993 and 2014 by the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute in Poland. The first Distinguished Benefactor is businessman, art collector and patron Gregory Jankilevitsch.

The current list of Distinguished Benefactors of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews includes:

- The Parasol family oraz The Bonita Trust

- Irene Kronhill Pletka and The Kronhill Pletka Foundation

- Foundation for Polish-German Cooperation

- Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany