ISSUES OF IDENTITY, MEMORY AND LOSS IN THE POST-WAR RECONSTRUCTION OF WARSAW

Dissertation by Magdalena Welcz

Visualisation of Warsaw presented in a movie “Warszawa 1920”.

Old Town - Krakowskie Przedmiescie street

The reconstruction of post-war Warsaw is a complex topic to discuss. The subject is barely men-tioned amongst today’s Polish society as it is a reminder of Soviets’ occupation and lost freedom. As someone who was born into a free Poland, I grew up with an extensive knowledge about World War II and its impact on my homeland. Such knowledge influenced my personal views, and probably my future career in architecture. It helped me to notice city architecture in more specific way. The recon-struction of Warsaw happened during what was clearly a hard time for Polish society. I would describe those changes as not only evident in the way the city looks, but also in people’s minds. How is it possible, that the beloved capital became a city hated by its own citizens. In this dissertation I will describe a sequence of causes and effects; how just a few bad decisions influenced entire genera-tions.

Not many people know exactly what pre-war Warsaw looked like. Common knowledge is mostly based on literature, and photographs placed on greeting cards. The majority of documents were burnt in 1944 along with the whole city;there are no plans and not many photographs left. In literary records, Warsaw’s architecture is often compared to that of Prague and Paris. In the early 30s it was a fast developing city with a large centre for culture and education. Warsaw was full of architectural differentiation, but it still worked perfectly as a metropolis. Finally independent after three partitions and World War I, Warsaw was a thriving capital. Generous loan from Americans helped to build over twenty five thousands of homes, a modern train station and Warsaw’s very first airport. Pre-war Warsaw was heading toward modernism and capitalism. City locals were willingly supporting econo-mists and scientists (the very first rocket engine was built at Warsaw’s university).The capital was proud of its architecture. It had an outstanding old town with richly decorated man-sions and a royal castle in the middle. At the end of one of the main roads there was a Prudential, the highest building in the country. The city skyline was mostly dominated by 19th century buildings, renaissance and neo-gothic churches and market halls.

Marszalkowska street

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Malgorzata Glowiska

Born in 1936, World War II and the Warsaw Uprising survivor. An author of a book “War in child’s eyes” (Wojna w oczach dziecka - orig. ) and a donator of many items in the museum of The Warsaw Uprising.She agreed to tell me about her experience as a child during war.

“I was just a child. When the Uprising started, i took a book and a teddy bear. That is all. If you go to Warsaw Uprising Museum, you can see my teddy bear on the exhibition. I donated it. I moved out from Warsaw before I turned 20. I was in love and I was about to get married. For over 60 years I live in Lublin, but I never considered it my home. Warsaw is my home. If I could afford it, I would move back there….It is funny, I was born in a very well-situated family. Now, I live in a small 2 bedroom flat and I cannot afford anything. All family goods are gone…I am still fighting to recover my family’s properties. We were owners of 3 mansions and a square next to Marszalkowska street. It is very funny, that legally i cannot car park on my square, but every winter I am receiv-ing a letter to remove the snow from MY piece of land. I had two older brothers. Both of them were fighting in Warsaw Uprising. The younger one was never found. The older one, Wojciech, was found on the river beach 3 years later. His body was found by 2 ladies having a walk. He got a head shot, probably from Soviets. “

For Poland 1st August 1944 is a symbolic date. It was the day when the Warsaw Uprising began. Residents fought for their capital, mostly losing their lives. The Warsaw Uprising, intended to be 3 days long actually lasted 63 days, during which nearly 90% of the architecture was demolished, and over 20 thousand lives were taken. Warsaw was labelled a “city of ruins” with no chance of being rebuilt. Even after it surrendered German forces ordered that Warsaw was to be burnt to the ground and all monuments and valuables stolen. Pre-war Warsaw was home to over 1,300,000 people. After the Uprising capitulation there were only 1,000 residents left;hiding in ruins. For most of them, the Warsaw Uprising was the most traumatic moment in their life. As Hans Frank wrote in his diary: "Almost all Warsaw is a sea of flames. To set houses afire is the surest way to deprive the insurgents of their hiding places. When we crush the uprising, Warsaw will get what it deserves – complete annihilation."

“I was 8 years old when the Warsaw Uprising started. We needed to move out from our mansion on Powisle and hide in cellars. We survived only because of nuns, who gave us a safe place. There was no water. I remember, that my father was waiting for many hours to have a shower in a dirty bath with water used by 30 other people. I remember us sitting in the cellars, while a young mother was making food for her newborn child upstairs. She did that given constant bombing outside. After a while people got used to bombs, noises and death. We had no water, no power, no beds, no food. People were dying from hunger. Often I was hearing Women giving a birth on a floor in cellars. It was terrifying.” - (Malgorzata Glowinska in a private interview, December 2015).

“ After Uprising all middle and high class families, including mine, were moved to Stutthof. It was a concentration camp placed near Gdansk. We were there for months. It was obvious that the new government wanted to get rid off polish intelligence. We left the city with nothing and when we came back we had no right to our family heritage.” (Malgorzata Glowinska in a private interview, December 2015).

Royal Castle during and after The Warsaw Uprising

German soldier burning whats left from Warsaw’s buildings

“City of ruins” - Interactive reconstruction of post-war Warsaw. Available to see in the Museum of the Warsaw Uprising

During World War II (1939 - 1945 ) the whole country, together with its capital, lost nearly everything. After 6 years of constant fighting and the defending of its borders, Poland was weak-ened. In 1945 Soviets came to Poland and took control of the country.

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Warsaw map after 1944.

Demolished during the Warsaw Uprising and never reconstructed

Demolished during the Warsaw Uprising and reconstructed fully or partly.

Preparations for the reconstructions started shortly after the first bombings in 1939, when Warsaw lost around 10% of its architecture. In 1944, following the capitulation of the Warsaw Uprising, the work of the reconstruction organisation changed. Prior to this, they had been focused on refurbishment, but from that moment onwards they were facing the need to carry out extensive reconstruction of the whole city. Many of the architects voted to keep Warsaw untouched, as a proof of Polish loss during the War. For the society it was obvious that the reconstruction must happen. Even today it is said that Warsaw residents were “voting with their feet” when this happened. Soon after the World War II, many people returned to the capital. What they saw is impossible to describe. Nearly 90% of buildings were burnt to the ground. The rubble was sometimes 4 metres high. The old city had 260 mansions; only 5 survived. German soldiers were given orders to erase the capital. “Few fragments of walls and the gate; that is all that remained after 1944, when Germans blew up the Royal Castle in Warsaw. After an earlier building fire in 1939, the construction leftovers were left untouched. The occupiers did not have any intention to rebuild the Royal Castle as in november 1939 the governor General Hans Frank noted Fuhrer approval for the Castle deconstruction. German planners, who were planning to convert Warsaw into the small german town, created many proposals for huge Folk Halls as a replacement for The Royal Castle. “ ( Ballada o okaleczonym miescie, 2006, p.44, Grzegorz Soltysiak). Burning Warsaw was intended to break people. It was surprising then, that most of the residents who survived heavy bombing returned to the ruins. They promised to help to reconstruct the city as they considered it to be the only solution.

“After war we moved to Katowice. My father got a job and I went to school. We could have stayed there. I wanted us to stay there, but my father wanted to go back home, to Warsaw and so we did. “ (Malgorzata Glowinska in a private interview, December 2015).

People had an emotional connection with the city and were ready to reconstruct it themselves. For Soviets who were planning to take control of Poland it became the perfect opportunity to sup-port reconstruction. It has been said, that Stalin himself said that he needed Poland as a separate country with Warsaw as a capital. This boast was an easy way to gain power and approval from Polish people. Poland was promised money from Soviets that would cover half the expense. Nothing could stop the reconstruction from happening.

Visualization showing how much rubble was removed from Warsaw after war.

A young women looking at rubbles. That is all whats left after Jewish Ghetto

People walking between ruins ; Krawkowskie przedmiescie, Old Town

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What came with the end of the 6-year plan was social realism and very powerful communism. Sovi-ets who quickly took over Poland were well known for their hatred toward Polish culture and architec-ture. As a result, social realism began to be the only permissible form of construction. This architec-tural order was a great way to wipe-out everything that was connected with patriotism and turn Warsaw into a typical socialist city. At first glance it worked perfectly;people who came back to the city were literally living in the ruins, having no proper space to sleep or eat. They were very happy that Soviets had promised to take care of them. All the propaganda that came along with Soviets, made people think that all their troubles finished with the end of World War II. All they needed to do was to trust the politics and simply be happy. Every resident was told that Warsaw would be recon-structed as a strong and modern capital with consideration of the needs of the residents. Everyone would be equal and satisfied. People who survived the war had already had too much of traumatic experience to notice the influence of the propaganda, that came with Soviet promises. They ignored all the symptoms showing how destructive the political influence can be on a city.

This picture shows a group of people carefully walking out from Rycerska street to Jezuicka street. Jezuicka’s street roadway is already cleaned up. In the back-ground there is a choir of the St John the Baptist Cathedral. Major part of the construction has survived the Uprising. This is the oldest preserved building in Warsaw, constructed in 1492. This is the place Piotr Skarga gave his preaches. This is the places Stanislaw Leszczynski and Stanislaw August Poniatowski were crowned. And what is the most important, this is the place The Constitution of May 3rd was sworn. (”Warszawa - Ballada o okaleczonym miescie” ,2006 , p.17, Grzegorz Soltysiak).

Firstly, there came a decree which allowed the city (politics) to make all buildings public. As a results people who came back to the capital after war had no rights to their own properties. This was sup-posed to fasten the whole reconstruction process, but the real reason was only to erase the middle class from the city. With no intelligence, aristocrats as residents, soviet were able to easily took control over not educated working class. That is the main reason, why the whole reconstruction process was so easily manipulated and completely redirected. “We buried all family goods in the foundations of our mansion. After a year, when we came back to Warsaw, we found out that all the goods were stolen and burned by Germans and the mansion was no longer ours. Locals gave it to a worker family and my father needed to buy a new flat. I still haven’t recover this mansion. The situation was very difficult, not only we needed to start everything from the beginning, we also had difficulties with registration. According to the new law, middle class residents had no right to check in. “ (Malgorzata Glowinska in a private interview, December 2015).

Residents of Warsaw during reconstruction works Life in post-war Warsaw ; funeral

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Pre-war Warsaw was in Soviets’ opinion full of sadness. Workers often did not have a proper homes with warm water and power. In central spaces, poorer people would live only on higher building levels. In contrast, rich people would have flats on lower floors with large windows and front building views. All of that was happening because of capitalism. The major idea for soviets was to fight it and eliminate society differences. As a consequence, majority of secession and XIX century mansions placed on the main streets were demolished. It was a planned move, as it filled the social realism pattern. Many of the reconstructable buildings were finally demolished without a bigger reason. Despite, many people were officially asking for reconstructing pre-Warsaw landmarks, authorities were blindly following soviets’ guidelines. Socialists’ architects decided that architecture from 19th and 20th centuries had no place in the new visions of urban planning. And yet it was this very Art Nouveau style which had characterised the architectural “makeup” of Warsaw before its’ destruction. What is more, this was the architecture that brought Warsaw residents back to the city. The first victims of the war were the steep mansard type roofs of tenement blocks, the corner turrets and the carved stonework which adorned the crowns of the buildings. These were mostly not recreated during the hasty reconstruction work which took place in the first years after war. Decorations of housing were now considered unfashionable and removed. “Saved” from demolition building were mostly covered in a smooth render.

The demolition of the striking neo-gothic Dominican Gallery, dating back to 1820, in front of the facade of the Dominican church on Freta street, approved by the Department of Conservation, was a true act of vandalism. This architectural style was in disfavour with the architects and conservators; the more fanatical among them consid-ered the style to be evocative of an era of nobility and bourgeoisie, while others tried to detect Germanic influences. (Budujemy nowy dom; 2013; p.143, Jerzy Majewski).

“This miserable pre-war Warsaw. Miserable, because it did not have one planned layout. Miserable, because it was built with thought of profits for owners. Miserable, because it was divided into better and worse parts. Miserable, because it was ugly.” - Jozef Sigalin

City designed with a harmony, having wide streets, large palaces, being full of light and greenery. City of happy people living in buildings, every which was outstanding. Architects reconstructing Warsaw had a chance to do something which was never done before. This was the job that could make every designer jealous, as they were the ones who were able to decide how the new Warsaw will look like.

“New Warsaw cannot be a repeat of the old one. It cannot be just a corrected repeat of the pre-war community of private businesses and capitalism. Architecture which has a lack of decorations will be better for working class, which does not understand complex forms. Warsaw will not be the same city as it was before. “ ( Boleslaw Bierut, interview in Polish Radio, 1955 ).

The Kronenberg Palace was the most spectacular aristocratic residence in pre-war Warsaw. Consumed by fire in 1939, its ruins were secured and it awaited reconstruction. This was not to be. The palace was on the historical register until late 50s’, but with the beginning of next decade it was demolished. (Budujemy nowy dom; 2013; p.115, Jerzy Majewski).

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Palace of the Culture and Science

The first completed social realism work was Muranow, a large housing estate. This set of buildings was constructed on Jewish ghetto rubble. Because there was no time to clean up, the rubble were covered with a ground over which the buildings were constructed.Most of the bricks used, were crushed brick concrete from ghetto ruins. There will be no decorations and no comfort in the small flats. All walls would be grey and all buildings will look the same. There were barely any greenery. Some buildings were built in 19 days, so not later than just a few months after Muranow was finished, some elevations started to crumble. People's happiness after moving into the very first own after-war flats was quickly gone and replaced by disappointment and anger. New city buildings looked nothing like the highly decorated mansions they used to live in. Moreover, not only the buildings did change; also their neighbours did. Because of the constant fight between local government and middle class society, most of the flats were given to working class, who simply could not see the difference between pre and after war architecture. Most of them were moved from smaller cities and villages, so they simply did not understand the art and culture.

Muranow built over Jewish Ghetto ruins.

This would be a moment, when Warsaw started to loose its’ identity. It was no longer representing people living in it. Most of them had no choice, than to accept the fact, that their beloved capital was gone. In a few year all reconstructions will stop, and promised by Stalin help will be limited in building a Palace of Culture and Science. This monumental construction was supposed to be treated as a Soviets gift for Poland. This building ( 237 meters high) dominated the panorama of Warsaw for many decades. As a social realism symbol, it transformed a considerable part of the city’s urban space. Palace of the Culture and Science was built on ruins of dense city centre. To construct it, the whole street of preserved buildings were destroyed. Moreover, it completely changed the geography of Warsaw. Given many protests and petitions to demolish it, the Palace is still a central point of the city and became an architectural icon. At the time when Palace of Culture and Science was created, people completely changed their view of Warsaw. Soviets architecture in the middle of the Polish capital, made it unpleasant and foreign for all residents. Through many decades and even now, people are still giving negative opinion about it. This construction created a conflict between an architecture and society.

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Since the beginning it was connected with soviets’ occupation and lack of control over own country. Famous from unique architecture and cultural events Capital, turned out to be a city which looked like a copy of Soviets’ Moscow and had no higher, cultured residential class at all. Social realism architecture was never officially criticized. On the other hand even before the 6 years plan ended, the very first dissatisfaction appeared. The falling of social realism was high-lighted by architects’ dreams of creating a perfect, monumental city. They could design and construct anything as they were not entitled by strict con-tracts or limited spending costs. So why did it not work? Why did they create something, that will be widely criticised years after. Why did they erase the greatness of Warsaw city in front of the resi-dents? The architecture was created for socialist society, which never existed. It was supposed to be real, but at the time “real” was a concept created by a propaganda. Soviets were not able to connect the politic with residents’ needs and expectations. The same happened to the architec-ture. Many enormous palaces appeared, as they were supposed to be filled with manifestations; unfortunately live is not only about manifesting. Built during communism terraces and arcades were mostly empty. Workers were not looking for culture in the city. They were mostly searching for local shops, kindergartens, commercial busi-nesses. They demanded extra spaces in their flats for activities they would be able to choose. All they wanted was to live in between the pleasant archi-tecture of happiness rather than “exist” between monuments. The community was simply not ready the be a socialist society in a socialist city.On the other hand many of the architects, whose job was limited to reproduce existing structures, used to say “You had some point” or “ Architecture was then an art”. With reconstruction of Warsaw many positive aspects appears. The capital have now one of the best communication systems in Europe. Most of the alleys and streets were adapted for today’s use. But all of that happen with a great sacrifice. The criticism began to enlarge, as architects seem to create buildings-paravans on the main roads instead of reconstructing the city as one piece. With entering a random social realism building; it turned out that the facade is hiding ripped, frag-mental pre-war architecture which did not have any connection with existing facade. Building were lacking of decorations and they were simply boring. Over 80% of buildings had never properly

reconstructed front walls, because of the low budget. On the other hand there were enough money to design and build the Palace of Culture and Science in just a few years. Fortunately, the economic inefficiencies of the communist system prevent destroying some parts of the city as the funds finished quickly after The Palace of Culture and Science was finished.

“The form is well behind the content. It started to be noticed, that buildings a pretending to be something they are not.” - J. Sigalin

At the moment we can hear a lot of people speculating whether did the city or people’s identity change along with the reconstruction. I think they both did. As I described, architecture began to be very unpleasant and monumental. On the other hand, at some point it fitted people that moved in to Warsaw after War. After all , there was no bourgeois or rich businessman who would visit theatres and parks. The archi-tecture was clearly not designed for original residents. It is hard to decide if it was good or bad. I think that the capital lost everything during war and even if the reconstruction was successful, the city would not be inhabited the same way. The war changed completely people’s views.

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What is the biggest difference between today’s and pre-war Warsaw? Today’s Warsaw is cut off the river. After Warsaw Uprising, Germans demolished strip of buildings, which was around 200 meters long. Till now, most of the area hasn't been return to the owners.

To sum up, society is now often commenting, mostly negative, the social realism architecture. Social realism finished as quickly as it appeared, but it brought irreversal changes into city architecture. At the moment Warsaw is a city filled with social realism architecture , which is visible on most major streets and alleys. It is clearly visible on Marszalkowska and Krucza streets or Jerozolimskie and Solidarnosci alleys. Over the city landscape we can still see the dominating Palace of Culture and Science. There are many alive discussions whether those buildings should be demolished or not. Surely, they are mostly connected with a very tough and unpleasant history of my country, but on the other hand they are architectural testimony of a very difficult times. There is a whole piece of history written on those buildings; dysfunctionalism of communism or the attitude toward individualism would be some of them. They became a landmark and part of an existing city. Without doubt they perma-nently erased the identity of a pre-war Warsaw as a happy and well cultured city. Now this architec-ture tells us that we have changed as much as our capital did and those changes were never defi-nately good or bad. People living in Warsaw now loudly insult the architecture and find it ugly. I think it will take another few decades for people to grow up to their own history and understand why the city architecture look so repulsively. It is been only 25 years since Warsaw’s people got back the chance to take control over the city architecture. Unfortunately for today’s society the whole demol-ishing and reconstructed process happens too long time ago to objectively decide if the changes were successful.

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- “Building a new home - The reconstruction of Warsaw in the period 1945-1952” 2013; Jerzy Majewski & Tomasz Markiewicz- “Marzenia o socjalistycznym swiecie ” - Krzysztof Mordynski - “illusion for a new society” 2009 - Makary Gorzynski- “Warszawa - Ballada o okaleczonym miescie” 2006 - Grzegorz Soltsiak - “Warszawa - lata 50.” 2004 ; Krystyna Sienkiewicz- “Warszawa Nowoczesna” ; Czeslaw Olszewski- “ Warszawa Niezaistniala” ; Jaroslaw Trybus

Additional materials :

- Documents available at the exibition in the Warsaw Uprising Museum- “Pianist” - movie directed by Roman Polanski- www.warszawa1939.pl- Interview with Malgorzata Glowiska and Czeslawa Tomczyk - war witnesses- “Miasto 44” - movie- “City of ruins” - short visualization movie

Bibliography: