Tatra Museum in Zakopane
There are almost ten and a half thousand ethnographic items in the Tatra
Museum. The earliest to reach the Museum in 1889 was a collection of woman's
clothes of the region of Czorsztyn on the River Dunajec in the Pieniny Mts,
donated by the then owner of the Czorsztyn estate, count Stanisław Drohojewski.
Today the collection is priceless because of the far-reaching tranformations of
the costume over the last century.
With time the Museum came into possession of other collections owing their
existence to the current enthusiasts of the culture of the region of Podhale. Most
included objects of considerable artistic value such as shepherd's or household
utensils decorated with relief, pictures painted on glass or fragments of
popular costume. They were acquired late in the 19th and early in the 20th
century as 'very old' so that some originate in the 18th century. Today their
value to ethnologists and folk art researchers is inestimate.
The Tatra Museum started systematic purchases in the region beginning in 1950
when it was nationalized and started to employ professional ethnographers. At
the time the Museum embarked on planned purchase of missing articles like
farming utensils. Though of negligible or none artistic value, they were
essential to the overall image of the culture of Tatra dwellers.
Only part of the ethnographic collection is accessible to the public. A
permanent ethnographic exhibition is on display in the main building. It gives
an image of folk culture in the region of Podhale at the close of the 19th
century and its present-day sequel in selected fields (e.g. painting on glass
and smithery). In Łopuszna, Chochołów, Jurgowa and Czarna Góra cottage
interiors and crofts of the turn of the 19th century are open to the
visitors.
A large number of items are in the repositories made accessible to Polish and
foreign researchers on request. A number of scholarly papers have been written
on the basis of the Tatra Museum's ethnographic collection. Set and costume
designers working for documentary and feature films on Tatra subjects have
found patterns for their work in the Museum.
Writed by Hanna Błaszczyk-Żurowska