Not Only Podzamcze

From 6 July to 31 August 2026 (originally announced to run until 15 August) the Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre showed archival photographs of pre-war Lublin that broke with the familiar image of the city as centred solely on the Podzamcze district; the museum’s words below are our translation of its Polish text, as the Centre publishes no English version of this page.

Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre on the exhibition (our translation from the Polish):

We invite you to look at Lublin as a shared, mutually interpenetrating space belonging to its former inhabitants. To Christians and Jews who also lived in Śródmieście and in Wieniawa, who strolled through the Saxon Garden, shopped at the city markets, ran businesses, founded sports associations, raised children and built their everyday lives in places that remain part of the present-day city. Each of the photographs on display is the beginning of one such story.

What to expect

Archival photographs gathered by the Centre’s Ikonography Workshop showed everyday city life in places less commonly associated with pre-war Jewish Lublin. The opening took place on 6 July 2026 at 11:00 on the terrace of the Centre at 21 Grodzka Street; the presentation given at the opening was translated into English.

Context

The opening formed part of “The Open Gate: A Lubliner Gathering”, the Centre’s programme held from 6 to 10 July 2026, a gathering for Lubliners and friends of the Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre.

The exhibition description remains available on the Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre’s website . The museum’s own announcement gave the run as 6 July - 15 August 2026; our scan of 21 August 2026 recorded a closing date of 31 August 2026, which we use here, though we found no source describing an extension.

After the show

“Not Only Podzamcze” closed on 31 August 2026. The Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre is currently showing “U with Two Dots” at Dom Słów (through 31 December 2026), Katarzyna Minasowicz’s exhibition on uprooting and on making an unfamiliar place feel like home, and the Prof. Józef Mroszczak International Typography Triennial in the Dom Słów gallery, which runs only through 30 September 2026. If one afternoon at Dom Słów is all you have, start with the Triennial, because it closes first.

The closest thing in Lublin to this exhibition’s method is “Voices That Never Fall Silent” at the State Museum at Majdanek (through 30 April 2027), likewise built from family photographs, documents and recollections, though around the fates of eight camp prisoners rather than around the pre-war city; its captions are in Polish and English.

We found no announcement of the exhibition travelling to another venue, no catalogue, and no press coverage from its run (6 July - 31 August 2026, originally announced to run until 15 August) in the titles we searched.

Museum profile: Brama Grodzka - Teatr NN Centre .