25th SIMCHA Jewish Culture Festival
This year’s Simcha will run from 29 July to 4 August, ending with an open Kabbalat Shabbat service. The festival will traditionally take place at the “Synagoga Pod Białym Bocianem” [“The White Stork Synagogue”] and other locations of the “Dzielnica Wzajemnego Szacunku” [“Mutual Respect District”] and in the centre of Wrocław. The programme includes, among others, many interesting meetings with authors, an excellent concert block, which will be opened with a performance by Klezmafour. There will also be performances by Magda Brudzińska Klezmer Trio, the White Stork Synagogue Choir and Michał Zator, Shum Davar (the Czech Republic), Hudaki Village Band (Ukraine) and Bester Quarter.
There will also be the traditional Jewish Fair, the Israeli Breakfast, Jewish language and culinary workshops, film screenings, guided walks on the trail of Jews in Wrocław, and many other attractions for adults and families with children. Lectures will be given by Dariusz Dekiert, Rabbi Stas Wojciechowicz, Mariusz Urbanek and Tamara Włodarczyk. Jerzy Kichler will invite to a Q&A meeting. SIMCHA’s anniversary will also be an opportunity to talk to the founders of the Festival.
25th anniversary of the SIMCHA Jewish Culture Festival
The quarter-century anniversary of SIMCHA is the occasion for a conversation on Wednesday i.e., 2 August between journalist Katarzyna Kaczorowska and the initiators of the SIMCHA Jewish Culture Festival – Karolina Szykier-Koszucka, Jerzy Kichler, then Head of the Jewish Community in Wrocław, and Stanisław Rybarczyk. The first edition was held in January 1999. At that time, the klezmer band Kroke and the White Stork Synagogue Choir performed, and lectures on Jewish themes and an exhibition were organised. All the events took place outside the White Stork Synagogue, where another stage of renovation was being completed. However, starting the following year, the Festival returned to the Wrocław synagogue. Until 2008, the directors of SIMCHA were Karolina Szykier-Koszucka and Stanisław Rybarczyk, and from 2009 to the present – Stanisław Rybarczyk.
SIMCHA continually rediscovers Jewish culture, develops awareness of the region’s multiculturalism and promotes the Mutual Respect District in Wrocław not only among the inhabitants of Wrocław and Lower Silesia, but also among audiences from other parts of the country, as well as from many parts of the world. Every year, the PRO ARTE 2002 Foundation invites to the festival events both in the space of the synagogue and in the Wrocław Jewish Community, as well as to the many unusual places of the Mutual Respect District. Meetings over the past quarter of a century have also taken place in many artistic and cultural institutions in Wrocław. Last year, the SIMCHA Israeli Breakfast was held at the Ethnographic Museum, and in earlier years at the Department of Jewish Studies at the University of Wrocław. What is important is that the organisers of the festival encourage not only people who are already familiar with Jewish culture to take part in the events, but also those who just want to get to know it.
All questions are kosher
Twenty-five years of the Festival is the time the organisers have devoted to promoting Jewish culture in Wrocław. Therefore, it should not be surprising that (in addition to the already standard activities that expand knowledge of traditions, customs and symbols) the programme now includes an unusual Q&A (question and answer) meeting, during which an activist from the Jewish community in Poland, the long-standing chairman of the Union of Jewish Religious Communities in Poland and the Jewish Religious Community in Wrocław, Jerzy Kichler, will be able to answer any question about Jewish culture – all questions are kosher.
Jewish music concerts
The charismatic Magda Brudzińska Klezmer Trio will present a beautiful and bold blend of tradition and modernity. Folk and klezmer sounds will be interwoven with elements of jazz, classical music and pop. Exceptional performances inspired by traditional songs and melodies of the Galician diaspora, Roma and Balkan music, as well as Polish folk and inter-war music. The Wrocław Choir of the White Stork Synagogue, conducted by Stanisław Rybarczyk, is the only synagogue choir in Poland. It sings works by Jewish composers, mainly synagogue music. It popularises the songs of the prominent Wrocław cantor, lecturer at the Wrocław Rabbinical Seminary in the years 1844-1889, Moritz Deutsch. During the 25th SIMCHA, the choir will give a concert with prestigious musicians: Michał Zator, Magdalena Dynowska (soprano), Piotr Bunzler (tenor), Piotr Rojek (organ, grand piano). “Klezmer Havdalah” will be played by Klezmafour as part of their most recent concert project, which takes an even more unique approach to Balkan klezmer. “Dr Balkan,” in addition to the eponymous hit song of the same title, surprises in various ways. The new compositions are an exploration of still virgin forms of klezmer music, such as klezmer trap (sic!). In addition to electronic novelties, Klezmafour goes back to its roots and presents further compositions, more classical, without electronics – but don’t be fooled – boiling energy is the band’s trademark. The Prague-based international Shum Davar, made up of musicians from Belarus, Georgia, the Czech Republic and Moravia, invites you to the concert “Tradycje bez granic” [“Traditions without borders”]. The band has been on the scene since 2013 and plays mainly folk songs, including Jewish, Roma, Eastern European and Caucasian songs. Their traditional repertoire is also complemented by accordionist Aliaksandr Yasinski’s original compositions. The concert programme of the 25th SIMCHA will also include artists from Ukraine. The Hudaki Village Band consists of nine village musicians from the Ukrainian-Romanian frontier region of Zakarpattia who have been performing together since 2001. HUDAKI are undoubtedly the most independent folk band in Ukraine. Their repertoire reflects the ethnic diversity of the Ukrainian Carpathians: the influences of Ruthenians, Hutsuls, Roma, Hungarians, Romanians and Jews are clearly visible. The work on the latest album “Yo!” and the creation of the new programme took a total of more than five years. Hence, the title from the local dialect, which could be translated as “Yes, finally!” The Bester Quartet invites you on a musical journey on the occasion of the band’s 25th anniversary entitled “Hustle&Bustle.” The formation is recognisable by its virtuosic and artistically daring repertoire, always perceived in terms of top-class music. The concert that they will play is inspired by Jewish culture, in particular the music of Ashkenazi Jews, and combines many different influences from different musical cultures from all over the world. Echoes of Italian, Bulgarian or Ukrainian folk music can be heard. It carries and blends elements of melody and energy from the deep-rooted Argentine tango tradition.
To attend all the concerts, tickets are required. Price: PLN 40/60. Tickets available: on Ticketmaster in the Media Markt shops, at Cocofli café/bookshop at ul. Włodkowica 9 and 2 hours before the concert at the White Stork Synagogue. Reduced tickets: pupils, students, seniors (60+)
Walking tours on the trail of Jews in Wrocław
At the turn of the 20th century, the old Wrocław spread its wings. The city, which was inhabited by ambitious, broad-minded and eager-to-business people, was enriched by large department and trading stores, banks, magnificent tenement houses, fashionable cafés, wine taverns and restaurants. Assimilated Jews had a tremendous impact on building the city’s splendour. They belonged to the social elite, including professors, doctors, lawyers, bankers, officials, architects and merchants. It is from this period that most of the representative buildings, which have fortunately been preserved to this day, come from. During the walk, we will learn the extraordinary stories of these places, their creators and owners, which will be told by Maciej Wlazło (Beard of Breslau).
In the ‘50s, buses full of audiences from all over the country used to arrive at the headquarters of the Lower Silesian Jewish Theatre. Why? To see popular performances, performed in Yiddish. Some of them were colourful, singing and dancing, and stood out from the coarse style of the Polish theatre of that time. It was in Wrocław that the Jewish theatre received its first truly post-war seat – a modern building at ul. Świdnicka. It was in this theatre that outstanding people met, both in the audience and on stage. Jewish newspapers, not only in Poland but all over the world and almost all Polish newspapers wrote about the unique style of the Lower Silesian Jewish Theatre. During the walk “Błądzące gwiazdy w końcu w domu?” [“Wandering stars finally home?”], Anna Kałużna will talk about what was performed on the stage of this theatre, who worked there and who came to the performances.
A walk outside the centre will be led by Tamara Włodarczyk (Jewish Social and Cultural Society), during which she will talk about Wrocław in the late 1920s and early 1930s, when the Beate Guttmann House for Single Women was opened and a modern Jewish hospital admitted patients regardless of religion. At the same time, Jewish boys and girls were learning modern languages and Latin at the nearby school in Menzelstrasse, and the Jewish football team Bar Kochba Breslau was playing matches on the football pitch in the same street.
Izabela Janicka, from the Museum of the City of Wrocław, will give a guided tour of the Old Jewish Cemetery, which is now open to the public as the Museum of Cemetery Art. It is an original and unique complex of tombstone sculpture and minor architecture. The first burial in the cemetery took place in 1856, the last in 1942. The appearance of the gravestones has undergone gradual changes over the years – from traditional matzevahs to bold in form and monumental family grave monuments. Many prominent Wroclaw citizens and residents rest in this cemetery, including artists, scientists, politicians and entrepreneurs.
In the capital of Lower Silesia, there is the “Mutual Respect District,” unique in Poland and Europe, where the Orthodox, Evangelical and Catholic churches and the synagogue belonging to the Jewish Community are located within three hundred metres of each other. The clergy and communities of these religions have been working together for more than ten years, creating a genuine dialogue. The initiators of the close cooperation of these communities included: Jerzy Kichler, priest Jerzy Żytowiecki, bishop Ryszard Bogusz, Janusz Witt, priest Aleksander Konachowicz. Professor Adam Jezierski would like to invite everyone to take a walk through this section of Wrocław.
The word “Stolpersteine” in German means “stones that we stumble against,” and this unusual concept to commemorate the victims of the Nazi regime was created by German artist Gunter Demnig in the 1990s. Since then, more than a hundred thousand cubes have already been set into place in many European countries. Wrocław was the first Polish city to have Stolpersteine. There are now more than a dozen of them, and more are planned, including one for the Jewish Herz family in front of the OP ENHEIM headquarters. The walk, which will be led by Karolina Jara, an art historian and OP ENHEIM Foundation employee, will provide an insight into the idea and public perception of this project, as well as joint reflection on various forms of commemoration in public space.
Registration is required for all walks. Registration details at: simach.art.pl.
Literary and author meetings
The SIMCHA Festival invites for meetings with authors and writers of books on Jewish culture, biographies and non-fiction literature: Agata Ganczarska, Jacek Tacik, Konstanty Gebert, Tamara Włodarczyk and Zbigniew Komorowski, as well as a Jewish Book Club talk hosted by Urszula Rybicka (Żydoteka).
The festival will be an opportunity to meet the author of the book “Pokój z widokiem na wojnę. Historia Izraela” (Agora, 2023). The former Polish ambassador in Tel Aviv, Maciej Kozłowski, writes about this position: “Konstanty Gebert looks at Israel from a special perspective: that of a religious Jew and, at the same time, a liberal democrat who was personally involved in fighting various forms of oppression in Poland and around the world. His story about Israel is vivid, but without icing and without glossing over the most difficult dilemmas. A fascinating reading.”
Urszula Rybicka will host a meeting with Jacek Tacik, the author of a controversial and reliable documentary exposing the cynicism and short-sightedness of those who believed it would be possible to remove the greys and stains from Polish-Jewish history – “Jak nie lubić Żyda?” [“How not to like a Jew?”]. Joanna Degler will talk to Agata Ganczarska about her latest publication, “Tutejszy – suwalskie korzenie twórczości Morrisa Rosenfelda,” which was released this year by the Pogranicze publishing house. This is the first Polish biography of this iconic Yiddish writer, supplemented in relation to existing biographical texts with previously unknown facts about his life, such as his complete change of identity.
Tamara Włodarczyk has been interviewing Polish Jews related to Wrocław for the past fifteen years, the transcript of eighteen of which make up the book published by AD REM, “Wrocławski jidyszkajt. Rozmowy z polskimi Żydami.” At the meeting, the author will tell a remarkable story of Jewish fates, but also of Jewish identity, of Jewishness, once called Yiddishkeit. An important group of interviewees were representatives of the so-called second generation of Polish Jews, born after the war in Lower Silesia, who played an important role in the reactivation of Jewish organisations in Wrocław in the 1980s and early 1990s. Another group of interviewees were Jewish emigrants, living in Israel, the United States and Sweden. Although they emigrated from Poland in the mid-1950s or after March ‘68, they still maintain contact with their country of origin and their bonds with Wrocław are very strong.
A meeting with Zbigniew Komorowski, author of “Sztetl Koluszki” (Księży Młyn Dom Wydawniczy, 2023) – a documentary record of the history of the Jews of Koluszki, a small town near Łódź, is also planned. The stories described in the book concern the fates of the Koluszki Jews in the inter-war period, during the Holocaust and after the war. In particular, the author includes the story of the Survivors, but also of the Righteous from Koluszki.
At the SIMCHA festival we will also be looking at a new novel by Israel’s most widely read writer! Zeruya Shalev is an author of bestsellers – readers know her for her books “Ból” [“Pain”] and “Mąż i żona” [“Husband and Wife”], among others. The subject of the Jewish Book Club meeting will be Zeruya Shalev’s novel “Los” [“Fate”] (W.A.B, translated by M. Sommer), which draws the reader in and intrigues from the first chapter as the book’s characters slowly reveal the secrets of their lives. The Israeli setting serves Shalev to tell an extraordinary story and makes us think about whether everything in life is a coincidence. The meeting will be hosted by Urszula Rybicka, founder of the Żydoteka Foundation – the organiser of the KKŻ.
Admission to all literary meetings is free. At each of the author meetings, it will be possible to purchase a book.
Presentation of Mira Żelechower-Aleksiun’s collection of paintings and conversation with the painter
The artist, Mira Żelechower-Aleksiun, who has lived in Wrocław almost all her life since 1946, will talk about what she has found in the Book of Ruth and the Book of Esther that is current and universal for people of the 21st century during the meeting “OBCY / OBCA”” [“Stranger”]. During the meeting, the painter will present her collection of paintings “Rut, Ester za zasłoną” [“Ruth, Esther behind the veil”], about which she writes: “The theme of the stranger in Judaism is taken up over and over again and the law obliges us to treat others with compassion because we ourselves were strangers. A vivid example is the Book of Ruth where the Moabite woman Ruth becomes the grandmother of King David so the Messianic lineage. It is also on this basis that I created the collection of paintings Ruth behind the veil and complementarily Esther behind the veil.”
The meeting with Mira Żelechower-Aleksiun will be hosted by Violetta Nowakowska, author of the book “Nie ma takich kobiet” [“There are no such women”] (Warstwy 2020) – a collection of fictionalized biographies of female inhabitants of Wrocław, which the publicist decided to write down in the collective memory.
Events for families with children
The programme of the 25th SIMCHA Jewish Culture Festival includes a series of activities dedicated to families with children. These include art workshops on Jewish symbolism, as well as activities to help the youngest learn about the tradition of Hanukkah. There are also planned an open-air painting workshop and learning the basics of the Hebrew language, Yiddish song workshops and classes in intercultural and interreligious education. The organisers also invite visitors for the Israeli Breakfast and Jewish Fair, where traditional flavours and products will be offered.
Registration is required for some of the workshops, details at: simcha.art.pl.
Workshops for adults
Simcha from Hebrew means joy, so the Festival could not miss a series of workshops devoted to Israeli movement and dance techniques. The organisers would also like to invite visitors to language classes conducted by university teachers – Anna Kałużna will present the basics of Yiddish, while Tomasz Duda – Hebrew. The programme also includes workshops: kippah crocheting, cooking and reading Jewish tombstones, i.e. “Odkryj z nami macew” [“Discover the matzevah with us”]. The festival’s accompanying programme includes a sommelier workshop at the “Zbawcy Win” [“Wine Saviours”], where participants will learn an overview of popular varietals grown in Israel using five kosher wines as examples.
Registration or booking is required for some of the workshops, details at: simcha.art.co.uk.
SIMCHA Cinema
As every year, the Festival invites visitors for film screenings related to Jewish culture. The programme includes five evening screenings – from Sunday to Thursday. The first of the meetings will be a film screening accompanied by a lecture of a musicologist Michał Jaczyński entitled “Wędrujące melodie i legenda o pewnym chazanie, czyli Stanisław Moniuszko na polsko-żydowskim pograniczu” [“Wandering melodies and the legend of a chazan, i.e. Stanisław Moniuszko on the Polish-Jewish frontier”], during which he will elucidate the issue of the transcultural transmission of Moniuszko’s compositional works. The scheduled screenings also include Mieczysława Kaut-Wazacz’s documentary film “VII Klasa” [“7th Form”] – the story of a group of Jewish friends from one form, born during the war, who grew up in post-war Wrocław. They were united by the school of the Society of Children’s Friends at ul. Trzebnicka 42, which was attended by many Jewish pupils. Most of them emigrated from Poland in 1957 and now they live in Israel, the United Kingdom, France and Denmark. In 2007, fifty years after they left, they organised a form reunion in their hometown. One of its participants was Mira Żelechower-Aleksiun, an outstanding painter from Wrocław, who was the only member of the form to stay in Wrocław. Before the film, the painter will talk about the circumstances of its creation. In the repertoire there is also “Genius Loci. Pinkus/Panusz” – the story of how great dreams and achievements become entangled with the inexorable reality of the history of the country, the city and the protagonist himself. A documentary story about the life of a man who, despite the turmoil of war and communist totalitarianism, boldly reached for his dreams – first by completing his PhD and going to the United States on a Rockefeller scholarship in the 1960s, and then by building the first Polish Molecular Biology Laboratory in Łódź. A story with a recurring pattern of returning to his grandfather’s house, which he fought for half a century to finally get it in times of hard investment.
Free admission to all screenings.
Lectures
Dariusz Dekiert during his lecture “W kręgu żydowskiej »młodej sztuki«” [“In the circle of Jewish »young art«”] will talk about the time of generational change in Jewish art in Poland – the early 20th century, which was accompanied by a tendency of artists to emphasise their otherness, freshness, modernity, and the adjective “young” was on everyone’s lips. A sense of artistic mission favoured the formation of artistic groups, as well as the establishment of contacts with like-minded artists, whether Jewish, Polish or German. An important example of these connections was the Łódź art group “Jung Jidysz,” founded in 1918, whose members wrote in Yiddish and German. The painters who belonged to it often lived in Germany or France, exhibiting in local art galleries. The graphic inspirations and revolutionary content were the product of many factors – historical, artistic and cultural. A native of Silesia, but a writer and publicist associated with Wrocław for many years, Mariusz Urbanek, will talk about why Shevah Weiss is a proof of the existence of God. Tamara Włodarczyk, a researcher of the history of Jews in Lower Silesia, will talk about the Wrocław roots of the Israeli king of pop – Svika Pick – a singer, composer and TV personality who began his musical education in Wrocław. Meanwhile, Magdalena Maślak, a researcher from the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, will talk about traditional Jewish cuisine. Rabbi Stas Wojciechowicz will also give his lecture “Abraham.”
Admission is free.
Source: Festival organiser
Translated by Kamil Sobierajski (student of English Studies at the University of Wrocław) as part of the translation practice.
