Rays of the South. Lights of the Borderlands

Galeria 72, the contemporary art department of the Museum of the Chełm Land, is showing paintings and drawings by Mariusz Woszczyński, a professor at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. He sets Mediterranean landscapes against the landscapes of Poland’s former eastern borderlands. The exhibition runs from 16 September to 20 November 2026. The museum’s own words below are translated from its Polish-language page; there is no English version of it.

Museum of the Chełm Land on the exhibition:

On 16 September 2026 at 18:00, in the museum’s rooms at 55 Lubelska Street, there will be a ceremonial opening of the exhibition of works by Mariusz Woszczyński, “Rays of the South / Lights of the Borderlands”.

(…)

His work is marked by an expressive brushstroke and a synthetic drawing that join nature and imagination. Genre scenes with signs of figures are led by a free trace of the brush on light grounds. In them the line joins organically with the patch of colour. In his landscapes the artist deliberately avoids classical converging perspective, building space through coulisse-like compositions (overlapping planes) or flatly, by joining sequences, which brings his landscapes close to abstraction. This second variety is represented by views from the South of Europe, whose Mediterranean character is underlined, alongside vivid accents of colour, by elements of nature such as palms or by ancient architecture. In the 2000s he completed a cycle of paintings and drawings describing places and landscapes historically connected with the borderlands of the First and Second Polish Republic. In his landscape compositions the artist’s style rests on figurative expressionism combined with a unique synthesis of nature and memory.

The exhibition is open until 20 November this year.

What to expect

The show occupies rooms at 55 Lubelska Street, the museum’s main building and the home of Galeria 72. The entrance is straight off the street, and the same ticket covers the rest of that building. The run is over two months long, so there is no need to rush.

According to the regional weekly Super Tydzień Chełmski, the display falls into two parts. The first grew out of the artist’s stays in Marseille, Düsseldorf and Brussels, with vivid colour and a recurring cyclist motif. The second is dedicated to the artist’s father and gathers muted landscapes from travels in Eastern Europe. That explains the two-part title: the “rays of the south” are the first group, the “lights of the borderlands” the second.

Allow 45-60 minutes for both parts, or an hour and a half if you add the permanent displays in the same building. This one rewards a visitor who likes gestural painting and can read a landscape as a construction rather than a postcard. Children will be bored quickly - these are canvases to be looked at quietly, with no interactive stations.

Context

Galeria 72 is not an ordinary temporary-exhibition room. It opened in September 1972 on the initiative of Kajetan Sosnowski, a leading figure of the Polish post-war avant-garde who spent his childhood in Chełm. For 28 years it was run by the critic Bożena Kowalska, who gave it a firmly abstract, geometric profile. The collection built around the gallery now holds close to two thousand objects, including works by Henryk Stażewski, Wojciech Fangor, Roman Opałka, Victor Vasarely and Josef Albers.

That is why this exhibition counts as an event in Chełm rather than one more painting show. The curator, Jagoda Barczyńska, told Super Tydzień Chełmski that it marks an expressive departure from the gallery’s previously strictly abstract profile. Woszczyński works in figurative expressionism, not geometry. He was born in 1965, took his diploma with distinction under Professor Rajmund Ziemski, and has headed a drawing and painting studio at the Warsaw Academy’s Faculty of Sculpture since 2005.

Tickets and time

There is no separate ticket for the exhibition: the museum’s price list covers permanent and temporary shows together. A single-building ticket is 20 PLN full price, 15 PLN reduced; a pass to all four buildings is 40 PLN and 30 PLN. With the municipal “Karta Chełmianina” or “Chełmska Karta 3+” card you pay 15 PLN and 10 PLN per building, or 25 PLN and 15 PLN for the pass. Children under 7 enter free; reduced rates apply to pupils, students, people over 65, pensioners and teachers.

Admission is free every Thursday, which is the cheapest way to see this show and the rest of 55 Lubelska Street at once. Hours are Tuesday to Friday 10:00-16:00 (10 AM to 4 PM), Saturday and Sunday 12:00-16:00, closed Monday, last entry 15:30. The Saturday closure that has applied to the building at 4 Świętego Mikołaja Street since 5 September 2026 does not affect this exhibition - Lubelska Street is open on Saturdays as usual.

The museum takes no online bookings and sells no timed tickets. A guided tour of one exhibition costs 50 PLN per group and has to be arranged by phone on +48 82 565 26 93.

English on site: the museum has no English-language website and states no English labels, audio guide or English-language tours for this exhibition, so expect Polish-only captions. Only the price list and the opening hours are published bilingually.

Events

• 16 September 2026, 18:00 - ceremonial opening in the museum’s rooms at 55 Lubelska Street (already held)

What the press says

Super Tydzień Chełmski (14 September 2026, Monika Łubkowska): a preview quoting the curator Jagoda Barczyńska, who calls the show an expressive departure from Galeria 72’s strictly abstract profile - article, in Polish .

See also

• Museum of the Chełm Land profile - four buildings, the Galeria 72 collection, hours and prices.
• Teresa Chomik-Kazarian. Four Seasons - the museum’s other autumn painting show, in the former Chapel of St Nicholas; one pass covers both.
• On the Way to the Academy - a local-history display in the same building on Lubelska Street, easy to add to the same visit.

Museum profile: Wiktor Ambroziewicz Museum of the Chełm Land .