Clouded Icons

Oil paintings by Paweł Wyborski, a painter steeped in the tradition of the icon, in the women’s gallery of the Small Synagogue in Włodawa. The opening was announced for 19 September 2026, and the museum says the show runs until October, with no closing day. The Polish title, “Ikony zmącone”, means clouded or troubled icons. The museum’s words below are our translation of its Polish page; the museum has no English-language website.

Museum - Synagogue Complex in Włodawa on the exhibition:

The exhibition “Ikony zmącone” (Clouded Icons) presents the painting of Paweł Wyborski, inspired by the matter of paint, by the icon and by the process of its fading and transformation. The artist reflects on memory, on transience and on the boundary between what is visible and what remains hidden. The exhibition is in the women’s gallery of the Small Synagogue and is open to visitors from September to October 2026.

What to expect

A single room: the babiniec, the former women’s section, in the Small Synagogue. The building is a former house of study whose 1930s wall paintings were uncovered in the 2023 restoration. The museum gives no count of works, no titles and no curator.

The photograph the museum uses for the show shows several paintings on muted pink walls, hung on dark vertical strips. One hangs in a lit niche. The largest show dark, barely outlined figures against a golden ground, in the arrangement familiar from icons.

The show’s own page gives only the opening month; the day and time come from the programme of the 26th Festival of Three Cultures, published by the museum. The opening, combined with a meeting with the artist, was announced for Saturday 19 September 2026 at 14:00. The programme for that festival Saturday had a distinctly Orthodox accent. It listed icon-painting workshops, a lecture on the Cross of Christ by Mitred Archpriest Jan Łukaszuk and a concert by the Grabarka male choir of Orthodox church music in the town’s Orthodox church.

Allow 15-20 minutes for the show alone. It pairs easily with the wall paintings of the same building, and the whole complex, with both synagogues and the kahal house, takes about two hours.

Context

Paweł Wyborski is a painter and a sociologist of culture. A biography published in 2023 by the Białystok Cultural Centre, for his show at its Ludwik Zamenhof Centre, says that he had been painting oils inspired by the aesthetics of the icon for 25 years. The same text lists seventy solo shows in Poland, the United States, the Netherlands and Belgium.

In 2020 he was among the finalists of the “Beyond the Frame” competition exhibition at Orleans House Gallery in London. He took part in the international master classes for icon painters in Nowica. His paintings are held by, among others, the museum in Grudziądz, Orleans House Gallery and galleries in Płock and Ostrów Wielkopolski.

The icon is the liturgical image of Orthodox Christianity, and Włodawa is a town of three faiths. A Catholic church, an Orthodox church and the synagogues stand within a walk of a quarter of an hour or so, and that closeness gives the Festival of Three Cultures its meaning.

Tickets and time

The price list has no separate ticket for temporary shows; the standard admission applies: 18 PLN full price, 12 PLN reduced. A family ticket (two adults and two children under 18) is 12 PLN per person, and holders of the Polish Large Family Card (Karta Dużej Rodziny) pay 12 PLN and 7 PLN.

Monday is not free here. Free Monday admission covers only the displays in the Great Synagogue building. The Small Synagogue is a separate building, so on a Monday “Ikony zmącone” costs 10 PLN full price and 7 PLN reduced, while Ewa Trafna’s “Pamięć” (Memory) in the Great Synagogue is free.

Weekdays only until the show closes. From October to April the museum opens Monday to Friday, 9:00-15:00 (9 AM to 3 PM), and is closed on Saturdays and Sundays (the museum’s opening hours , in Polish). A weekend trip to Włodawa for this show no longer works. None of the holidays on which the museum closes falls in October.

The closing date is a month, not a day. The museum says the show is open “from September to October 2026”, with no closing day; this page’s calendar uses 31 October. That is a Saturday, when the museum is closed, so the last day you can count on is Friday 30 October. If you plan to come in the last week of the month, phone first: +48 538 412 654 or +48 82 572 21 78.

The museum has no English-language website and does not say in which language the labels next to the paintings are. Groups book two days ahead, by phone or through the reservation form on the museum’s site (in Polish). A guide costs 100 PLN in Polish and 200 PLN in English.

Who it is for: visitors to the synagogue complex who will step into the Small Synagogue anyway, and anyone interested in contemporary painting that grows out of the icon. Who can skip it: a visitor who came only for Włodawa’s Jewish heritage and is short of time - the show is not about the town’s history or its Jewish inhabitants.

What the press says

One festival preview, which mentions the show only in the programme; no reviews were found.

Nowy Tydzień (18 September 2026, editorial staff): a festival preview that lists the opening of “Ikony zmącone” among the Saturday items, next to the icon-painting workshops - article, in Polish .

See also

• Museum - Synagogue Complex in Włodawa profile - the Great and Small Synagogues, the kahal house, seasonal hours, prices and tips.
• Memory - Ewa Trafna’s exhibition - the complex’s second temporary show, in the Great Synagogue’s upper women’s gallery; free on Mondays.
• Frontier - paintings by Piotr Kowieski - the third temporary show, in the kahal house, open until May 2027.
• Museum and Memorial Site in Sobibór - 16 km from Włodawa, the natural second half of the same day.

Museum profile: Museum - Synagogue Complex in Włodawa .