Marian Ruzamski returns to the Palace of Art after 100 years!

The artistic work of Marian Ruzamski almost vanished from collective memory during the catastrophe of the 20th century and is now experiencing a remarkable comeback. A century after his last appearance in Krakow, the artist is once again being honored at the Palace of Art.

Marian Ruzamski was born in 1889 in Lipnik near Bielsko-Biała and came from a culturally diverse family. His mother was a French Jew, and his father was a Polish notary. In 1914, he was awarded a prize and a scholarship to Paris by the Friends of the Palace of Art in Krakow. However, as a citizen of Austria-Hungary at the time, the young, highly gifted artist was unable to complete the scholarship in Paris and, due to the outbreak of the First World War, was forced to leave France as an "enemy alien." Upon returning home, he was deported to Kharkiv by Russian troops. He returned from the turmoil of the Russian Revolution deeply traumatized to the newly free Polish state. During the German occupation of Poland in World War II, Ruzamski was denounced in 1943 as a Jew and a homosexual, deported by the Nazis to Auschwitz, and later transferred to Bergen-Belsen, where he died on March 8, 1945, shortly before the end of the war.

Yet, although Ruzamski's life was overshadowed by war, persecution, and violence, his works tell a different story. His paintings are characterized by a profound humanity, by scenes of everyday life, and an almost ethereal lightness—as if another, peaceful century was passing before us. They are poetic, evocative images that recall summer landscapes, not terror and destruction.

Over 130 artworks from all phases of Ruzamski's career are now being shown in a major retrospective in Krakow, following their initial presentation in Solingen: from his earliest drawings from his art studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow under Jacek Malczewski, through works created during his captivity in the First World War, pieces from the interwar period, to the harrowing portraits Ruzamski created in the camp infirmary of the Auschwitz concentration camp – the so-called "Auschwitz Portfolio." These 47 portraits, created under the most inhumane conditions, stand as a memorial of art against barbarity and represent the tragic culmination of his work – a Polish Guernica, a monument against forgetting.

The exhibition was created in cooperation with the Tarnobrzeg Castle Museum and the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum and is supported by the Foundation for German-Polish Cooperation, the Gerd Kaimer Civic Foundation of Solingen, and the Federal Foreign Office of the Federal Republic of Germany. The Mayor of Krakow, Aleksander Miszalski, and the German Consul General, Holger Mahnicke, have assumed patronage.

The exhibition was initiated by Holocaust survivor Marian Turski, who passed away on February 18, 2025. This exhibition is dedicated to him, who dedicated his life to fighting against forgetting and to preserving the memory of the victims of Auschwitz.

The exhibition will be opened at the Palace of Art by Ina Brandes, Minister for Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, on April 9, 2026, at 6:30 p.m.