"Bartne: A Village on the Heritage Register. A Photographic Record" - Archival Photography Exhibition

The Gorlice museum (Muzeum - Dwory Karwacjanów i Gładyszów) is showing black-and-white photographs of the historic buildings of Bartne from the 1960s to the 1980s. The venue is the village’s wooden Greek Catholic church of Saints Cosmas and Damian, a branch of the museum. The show is open from 17 October to 29 November 2026; the museum announced the opening for Saturday 17 October at 15:00. The museum has no English text on the show; the words below are our translation of its Polish description.

The Gorlice museum (Muzeum - Dwory Karwacjanów i Gładyszów) on the exhibition:

The exhibition presents a selection of black-and-white photographs taken in the 1960s-1980s in Bartne, a village in the Low Beskids. The pictures show the vanishing cultural landscape of a Lemko village, as well as the work of heritage conservators whose aim was to preserve that landscape.

The photographs come from the collections of the Gorlice museum (Muzeum - Dwory Karwacjanów i Gładyszów w Gorlicach), the Voivodeship Office for the Protection of Monuments in Nowy Sącz and private collections.

What to expect

The church holds a selection of black-and-white pictures taken in Bartne between the 1960s and the 1980s. They show the buildings of a Lemko village that was already disappearing, and the work of the heritage conservators who tried to save that landscape. The photographs come from the museum’s own collection, the Voivodeship Office for the Protection of Monuments in Nowy Sącz and private collections. The museum gives neither the number of photographs nor the names of the photographers. The exhibition poster shows wooden houses, some of them thatched, a village road, a roadside shrine and the church itself.

The museum does not explain the title, but the heritage register says a good deal here. According to Wikipedia, Bartne has more than twenty entries in the regional register of listed buildings: both churches, two cemeteries, a shrine and well over a dozen cottages, granaries and complete farmsteads. After the photographs, it is worth a walk through the village to see which of those views still stand.

The church alone justifies the trip. According to the museum, it was built of fir in log construction, probably in the 18th century, and thoroughly rebuilt in 1842. Inside stands a multi-tier iconostasis from the second half of the 18th century incorporating older 17th-century icons, conserved again in 2025, and an altar from 1797. The icon of the patron saints, Cosmas and Damian, is now in the Łańcut Castle Museum (Muzeum - Zamek w Łańcucie).

Just beyond the fence, in a stone parish granary from the first half of the 19th century, the museum shows a display on Bartne’s folk stone-carving. The museum does not say whether the church ticket covers it, so ask the guide when you book. Allow 45-60 minutes for the church, the photographs and the granary. That is our estimate; the museum gives no visiting time.

Context

Bartne is a linear village in the Sękowa municipality in the Low Beskids (Beskid Niski), first recorded in 1629. It was a Lemko village: in 1947, during Operation Vistula, its entire population was deported, and some families returned only at the end of the 1950s. The father of the composer Dmytro Bortniansky also came from Bartne.

The village was famous for its stonemasons. According to the museum, it was the largest stone-carving centre in the central Lemko region, recorded from the 17th century and active until the deportations of 1947; it produced crosses, gravestones, quern stones and millstones. One Bartne cottage (chyża), a Lemko house from 1928, was moved to the Tar-Makers’ Homestead (Zagroda Maziarska) in Łosie, the museum’s other branch in the area.

Tickets and time

Admission: entry to the church costs 5 PLN, reduced 2 PLN, and also 2 PLN with the Polish Large Family Card (Karta Dużej Rodziny). The church’s price list has no separate ticket for temporary shows, so ordinary admission covers the photographs. That is our reading of the price list; the museum does not say it in so many words.

Phone first: the church can be visited only after booking by phone with the guide, Father Łukasz Kopcza, +48 18 351 84 54. Without that call you may find the door locked, even within opening hours.

Hours: Monday to Thursday 9:00-17:00 (9 AM to 5 PM), closed on Friday, Saturday 9:00-18:00, Sunday 14:00-18:00. During the run the church is closed on 1 and 11 November. The museum publishes one timetable for the church all year round, with no separate winter hours, so it holds until the show closes. The last day, 29 November, is a Sunday, when the church is open 14:00-18:00. Unlike the museum’s other branches, the church is open on Monday and closed on Friday. Current rules are on the museum’s tickets and opening hours page (Polish only).

Free Tuesdays: the museum makes Tuesday a free day at all its branches, and the church is one of them. Since the show has no separate ticket, the free Tuesday should cover it as well - again our reading.

Combined ticket: “homestead + church” costs 13 PLN, reduced 7 PLN, and is valid for seven days. Separately you would pay 17 PLN: 12 PLN for the homestead and 5 PLN for the church. The combined ticket therefore pays off for anyone who adds the Tar-Makers’ Homestead in Łosie, unless you go on a Tuesday.

Who it is for: worth it for hikers in the Low Beskids and for anyone curious about the architecture of a Lemko village. The Main Beskid Trail (Główny Szlak Beskidzki) runs through Bartne, so a visit fits easily into an autumn walk. As the only reason for a long trip the show is a gamble, because the museum says nothing about its size; the church and the granary do justify the journey, though.

See also

• Jacek Kosiba “Black and White Beskid” - black-and-white photographs of the Low Beskids at the Tar-Makers’ Homestead in Łosie, until 20 December 2026; a good pairing with Bartne for one day and one combined ticket; both are open in October from Tuesday to Thursday and at the weekend, and from November from Tuesday to Thursday and on Saturday.
• Jan Gryboś “In the Rhythm of the Old Village” - folk sculpture at the open-air museum in Szymbark, the same museum’s outdoor branch, until 14 November 2026.
• Karwacjan Manor Art Gallery in Gorlice - the museum profile, with the manor’s renovation and every address that stays open while it lasts.

Museum profile: Karwacjan Manor Art Gallery in Gorlice .