Lemkin Collection
The 'Lemkin 2018' project is a series of activities that serve to broadly promote the figure and accomplishments of Lemkin, as well as to revive interdisciplinary reflection on the historical significance and relevance of his concepts. In June 2018, the Institute opened the Lemkin Collection at the University Library in Warsaw.
In consultation with prominent specialists in the field of international law, we selected over 160 books dedicated to Lemkin and genocide studies, and purchased and donated them to the Library, in collaboration with the law firms CMS, GWW, KKLW and Weill. It is the first and, so far, the only such collection entirely devoted to the subject of genocide.
'Witness of the Age of Genocide: Rafał Lemkin and the 1948 Convention'
December 2018 was marked by the 70th anniversary of the UN's adoption of the Genocide Convention, commonly known as the 'Lemkin Convention'. From 3-5 December at the University of Warsaw we organised an international scientific conference 'Witness of the Age of Genocide: Rafał Lemkin and the 1948 Convention'. Over the course of the conference, experts from Poland and abroad discussed Lemkin’s legacy.
Contemplating the historical significance and topicality of his concepts, we explored his connections with pre-war Poland and its scientific environment. We emphasised his rootedness in the multinational and multicultural tradition of the Polish Republic and the personal experience of confrontation with two totalitarian regimes, without which it is difficult to understand the origin of the Lemkinian concept of genocide - one of the most significant intellectual responses to the great tragedies of the 20th century.
Exhibition
A significant activity within the project was also the preparation of a temporary exhibition by the Pilecki Institute, titled 'Lemkin: Witness of the Age of Genocide' - the first temporary exhibition in Poland dedicated entirely to Rafał Lemkin. In the exhibition, we use photographs, documents and audiovisual materials from the US archives, which have never been presented in Poland until now. We tell the story of a man who was born on the Polish Eastern Borderlands, then studied and worked in the Second Polish Republic, from which he had to flee from the German terror to the United States to compile and document the concept of genocide. We present the life and work of Lemkin against the background of the tragedy of German and Soviet occupation in Poland, as well as Central and Eastern Europe, the focal point of the mass crimes of two totalitarian regimes.
The personal belongings of genocide victims and individual accounts of survivors that we present in the exhibition are testimonies to these crimes. The items include, among others, glasses dug out from the vicinity of crematorium III, derived from the collections of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, and a cigarette case from the collection of the Katyń Museum belonging to Captain Karol Glazur, a Polish officer murdered in Katyń. The message of our exhibition is the conviction that the fate of communities that fell victim to genocide still depends primarily on them - on whether they preserve their tragic experiences, manage to overcome them and, on their bases, build a successful future for themselves. The state of Israel, the Solidarity revolution in Poland, and the Majdan revolution in Kiev are positive examples of such efforts. Consequently, they are the epilogue of our exhibition, which can be viewed until 6 January 2019 in Warsaw's Kordegarda - NCK (National Centre for Culture) gallery.