FACES OF TOTALITARIANISM

EXHIBITION AT THE HISTORY MEETING HOUSE (HMH)

28 SEPTEMBER 2009 – 17 JANUARY 2010
HMH, 20 KAROWA STREET, WARSAW

The multimedia exhibition Faces of Totalitarianism authored by the KARTA Centre is returning to the History Meeting House. Supplemented and rearranged, it shows the origin and development of both totalitarian systems: Nazism and Communism and their wartime height.

The panoramic presentation is divided into a dozen or so parts depicting Central and Eastern Europe from the end of World War I to the fall of the Communist system in 1989. It covers the 1917-Revolution, Polish-Bolshevik War, time of the Great Terror in the USSR, origin of the Third Reich, period of alliance of both totalitarianisms and their later struggle, both occupations, Holocaust, expulsions, end of Nazism and further expansion of Communism. The exhibition, which shows the mechanism of operation of the totalitarian system primarily on the example of Poland’s complicated past, ends with a chapter on Poland’s post-war history and her effective opposition against Communism.

Apart from short introductions to its individual parts, the exhibition consists exclusively of historical testimonies: source texts (excerpts of documents, letters, and speeches), photographs, archival films, Soviet and Nazi propaganda posters or recordings of speeches.
The confrontation of official documents, orders, justifications of political decisions and leaders’ speeches with very personal accounts by eyewitnesses of events underlines the dimension of individual tragedies of victims of totalitarian systems.

Walenty Woronowicz, prisoner of Soviet forced-labour camp: In winter, feet, hands and faces were often injured by frostbites. Exhausted organisms did not have enough strength to defend themselves. […] When the frostbitten foot fingers started to turn black, they were removed in a barbaric way. Two people held the sick person, and a physician or paramedic removed the blackened fingers with pincers. […] Towards the end of December 1941 frost intensified and temperature dropped to minus 63 degrees centigrade. […] People were getting weaker and weaker every day, even the ones who worked inside. Finally, they started refusing going out to work. They were threatened with court-martial and shooting for sabotage, but threats did not help. Then, beatings started. People died after the first blow, one after another.

Anna Pawelczyk, a resident of Kitów who survived the pacification of the Zamość area: A total of 164 people were killed on a single day, I was the only one to survive. [...] After a meeting the Germans came to the square with three machine guns and placed them against the people; after a while, one of the Germans started to speak. He said that all the people had to die, because they were cooperating with bandits. […] The Germans started firing at the people gathered there. I fell down and hid my head under my mum’s arm [...]. The shooting finally died away. A young woman rose then and started to beg to be spared. Then, I heard loud laughs of the Germans who started jumping on the corpses. [...] A Nazi came to me and put his hand on my back, checking if I was alive. I waited with bated breath. The German listened but when he saw that I did not move, he went away.

In addition to accounts by Polish eyewitnesses, the exhibition also includes recollections by Ukrainians, Russians, Jews and Germans; next to voices of the victims of repression, there are also statements by aggressors. The presentation of Europe’s totalitarian experience in the 20th century from the perspective of many nations and through different attitudes gives a universal character to the exhibition and permits us to see the distinct similarity of both totalitarian systems. The exhibition is in four languages: Polish, German, Russian and English.

The exhibition is open at the History Meeting House at 20 Karowa Street from 28 September 2009 through 17 January 2010 Monday through Friday between 10.00 a.m. and 6.00 p.m. and on Saturdays and Sundays between 11.00 a.m. and 5.00 p.m. ADMISSION FREE.