Roots and Sky. The Polish Chapter in the Collection of the Kyiv National Art Gallery

The Kyiv National Art Gallery holds a modest but compelling group of works by Polish painters of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century - until now largely unknown in Poland. The exhibition in the Malarnia Hall of the Gallery of 19th-Century Polish Art at the Sukiennice presents it to a wider public for the first time.

The National Museum in Krakow on the exhibition:

Established in 1922, the museum holds a rich and diverse collection of approximately fourteen thousand objects, primarily paintings dating from the 13th century to the present day. The core of the Gallery’s holdings is formed by works originating from private Kyiv collections that were nationalised during the Soviet era. Among the most valuable and best-known of these are the collections of the Tereshchenko and Khanenko families, as well as that of Oskar Hansen.

A significant part of the Kyiv National Art Gallery’s collection is formed by works of Polish artists from the 19th and the first half of the 20th century. Although relatively modest in scale, it is of considerable artistic and historical interest. In Poland, however, it has thus far remained largely unknown to the wider public.

The team of the National Museum in Kraków, invited by the Kyiv museum to collaborate on the project, worked with its partners to select works by nine Polish painters. Representing different artistic periods - from early Romanticism to the interwar era - the selected works are strikingly diverse in both stylistic and iconographic terms.

What to expect

The exhibition brings together works previously unseen in Poland by Aleksander Orłowski (1777-1832), Henryk Siemiradzki (1843-1902), Wilhelm Kotarbiński (1848-1921), Stefan Bakałowicz (1857-1947), Jan Ciągliński (1858-1913), Leon Wyczółkowski (1852-1936), Leon Kowalski (1870-1937), Stanisław Żukowski (1873-1944) and Marian Stroński (1892-1977). The exhibition design is by Anna Popławska-Szilder, with a coordination team of Gabriela Kuleczko, Katarzyna Stolarz, Aleksandra Kłaput, Katarzyna Myszor-Kucmierz and Anastazja Kowalenko.

Museum director Andrzej Szczerski points to several names that are largely forgotten today, singling out Stefan Bakałowicz - a respected academic painter worth rediscovering through the Kyiv collection’s lens - and Marian Stroński, a twentieth-century painter close to post-impressionism and the Paris École de Paris. Wilhelm Kotarbiński spent roughly thirty years of his life in Kyiv, which is exactly why his work ended up there rather than in a Polish collection.

Context

Several of the nine painters worked or trained outside Poland - Kotarbiński in Kyiv, Siemiradzki for most of his career in Rome - which is precisely how their paintings entered a Ukrainian collection rather than a Polish one, staying essentially unknown in Poland until now. The Kyiv National Art Gallery, founded in 1922, keeps operating despite the war: its historic building was damaged by Russian missile strikes in 2022, yet the museum continues its work and still lends pieces abroad. As acting director general Oksana Pidsucha has said, the exhibition was prepared in a difficult period and under extreme conditions, during the full-scale war that Russia is waging against Ukraine, and the museum frames it as a gesture of gratitude toward Poland for its support of Ukraine.

Tickets and time

Admission to the exhibition is included in the branch ticket - there is no separate ticket for this show. A standard ticket costs 35 PLN, a reduced one 25 PLN, and a family ticket 70 PLN. Pupils and students up to their 26th birthday pay 1 PLN for the permanent exhibitions on showing a valid student ID, and children under 7 get in free. On Tuesdays admission to the museum’s permanent exhibitions is free; the museum does not say whether this also covers the temporary exhibition. If you go on a Tuesday, expect heavier crowds than on other days. The gallery is open Tuesday-Sunday 10:00-18:00, last admission 20 minutes before closing, closed Mondays. Together with the permanent collection’s four rooms, budget 60-90 minutes. This is a good stop for anyone wanting to see Polish painting through a rarely shown Ukrainian lens - not for visitors expecting multimedia or interactive displays.

Events

• Guided tour for visitors aged 60+ - 24 September 2026, at Sukiennice. Included in the exhibition ticket, advance booking required (rezerwacja@mnk.pl or +48 12 43 35 744 ext. 2, Mon-Fri 9:00-16:00).
• Curator-led tour - 18 October 2026, the exhibition’s closing day, led by Dr Beata Studziżba-Kubalska, author of the exhibition scenario. Included in the ticket, same booking route.

What the press says

LoveKraków.pl (26.06.2026, Kinga Poniewozik, in Polish): describes the show as the first exhibition of its kind in Poland and notes it was put together despite the ongoing war, through cooperation between the two museums - link

Updates

• 2026-09-13: added curatorial context and background on the Kyiv National Art Gallery’s wartime situation, ticket and free-Tuesday details, two upcoming guided tours, and a first verified press item. The exhibition dates (26 June - 18 October 2026) and the museum’s quoted text are unchanged.

See also

• Polish Fashion in the MNK Collection - another temporary show within the National Museum network, at Kamienica Szołayskich.
• Satire and Comics by Jan Matejko - Matejko, whose canvases hang permanently in these same Sukiennice galleries.
• Czartoryski Museum - a sister National Museum branch five minutes’ walk from Sukiennice.

Museum profile: Sukiennice - Gallery of 19th-Century Polish Art .