The author lives in the Podkarpacie region — a land where, for generations, Sarmatism intertwined with Hasidism, Greek Catholics with Orthodox Christians, Polish peasants with Lemkos. For years he has been photographing the vanishing traces of this multicultural heritage: abandoned cemeteries, wooden Orthodox churches and chapels — places that are now almost forgotten.
"What remains are leaning matzevahs, silent witnesses of those times. But new notes with requests still appear on them, small stones added to the large stone slabs, hats swaying above them, beards bowing. One can listen to the sound of psalms, which carry, much like nostalgic klezmer music: suffering, love, and pain. The phenomenon of 'exile and return.'"
The event takes place as part of European Heritage Days 2026 under the theme "The Future of the Past. Heritage at Risk" — in the spirit of saving the traces of the region's multicultural history from oblivion.
