Między strychem a „Rodziną człowieczą”. Geneza i recepcja wystaw Aleksandry Garlickiej
Between the Attic and “The Family of Man”. The Origin and Reception of Exhibitions Shown by Aleksandra Garlicka

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this article is to expand knowledge about the role played by photography in the process of pro-democratic sociosystem transformations during the declining period of the Polish People’s Republic and the first years of transformation. By concentrating predominantly on non-artistic practices, the authors discuss the initiatives, insufficiently recognized up to now, of Aleksandra Garlicka, historian and curator, and analyse five exhibitions organised by her in 1985–1995. By basing themselves on archive sources, interviews, and literature on the subject the authors demonstrate the manner in which Garlicka made use of archival and family photographs in order to create an alternative history of Polish society at the end of the Polish People’s Republic. These exhibitions, on show (with a single exception) at Zachęta, the most important Polish art gallery, and widely popular among the public, challenged, although initially unintentionally, official communist historiography and enabled Poles to become acquainted with their concealed heritage and history. The article also discusses the origin and significance of those exhibitions against the background of changes occurring in Polish photography from the end of the 1970s.

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