Thoughts and opinions from a Priest in the PNCC
From the North Colonie Ministerial Association:
The Martin Luther King, Jr. And Coretta Scott King Lecture Series will present a lecture given by Dr. Michael Eric Dyson on “(African) American Leadership in the 21st Century: King, Obama and the American Dream” to be held on Tuesday, April 7, at 7:00 p.m. at the Alumni Recreation Center at Siena College, 515 Loudon Rd., Loudonville, NY.
The book Tortured for Christ
New York District 2 of the Polish Army Veterans Association in conjunction with the Kosciuszko Foundation is sponsoring an essay contest on the subject: The Worldwide Significance of the 1939 Invasion of Poland.
The contest is open to Polish-American students between the ages of 18 and 22. A first place prize of $2,000 and a second place prize of $1,000 will be awarded.
The contest will be judged by Maria Szonert-Binienda, Professor Donald Pienkos of the University of Wisconsin and Professor Thaddeus Gromada, President of the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences.
The deadline for entries is July 1, 2009. Results will be announced September 1, 2009.
Information is available by calling 330-666-7251 or from the Kosciuszko Foundation, 15 East 69th St., New York, NY 10065.
Further details, specific instructions, and applications are available here.
Know a New York School that Goes Above and Beyond in Arts Education? Nominate them for the Schools of Distinction in Arts Education Award!
Deadline: Friday, March 27, 2009.
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Schools of Distinction in Arts Education awards program provides an important outlet for expanding recognition of the role individual schools play in providing a creative learning environment for outstanding student achievement.
This award provides a great opportunity for the New York State Alliance for Arts Education to highlight a New York school that has developed exemplary arts education programs. State winners are submitted for consideration at the national level, where they receive an honorarium, a plaque for display, and the opportunity to perform at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.
To be considered for the State level of this award, your school’s arts education program should have most of the following characteristics:
To learn more about this award, and to download an application, please go to the NYSAAE projects website.
The St. Peter Armenian Church community extends a cordial invitation to join us for a “Meet the Author” event being held at St. Peter Church on Sunday, March 29, at 12:30 p.m.
All are invited as St. Peter Armenian Church welcomes author Tom Mooradian for a presentation and book signing on Sunday, March 29, immediately following services, in the Gdanian Auditorium of the church located at 100 Troy Schenectady Road, Watervliet. Tom is the author of The Repatriate: Love, Basketball, and the KGB
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call the church office at 518-274-3673.
From the Valley Independent: Polish exhibit opens Sunday
MONESSEN – Preparing for a new exhibit at the Monessen Heritage Museum was a trip down memory lane for a group of women who wanted to celebrate their Polish ancestry.
Bittersweet tears flowed as Monessen residents Dorothy Jozwiak, Sophia Janol, Gloria Belczyk and Irene Babinski dug out treasures from their past for the new Polish Heritage Exhibit.
The exhibit will be on display at the museum, 505 Donner Ave., from Sunday to June 1.
The Greater Monessen Historical Society is hosting an open house for the new exhibit from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday.
Museum hours after Sunday will be 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays.
The exhibit coincides with the centennial anniversary of the former St. Hyacinth Polish Church and its women’s Rosary Society.
St. Hyacinth eventually merged with the four other ethnic Roman Catholic churches to form Epiphany of Our Lord parish.
The exhibit also pays homage to the former Sacred Heart of Jesus Polish National Church in the city.
Jozwiak, whose parents emigrated to Monessen from Poland, is the historian for the St. Hyacinth Church and has preserved many church relics that are now on display at the museum.
She believes it’s important to preserve and honor the accomplishments made by Polish people when they came to the city more than 100 years ago.
The largest wave of Polish immigration to America occurred in the early 20th century. More than 1.5 million Polish immigrants were processed at Ellis Island from 1899 to 1931.
“The Poles contributed a lot when they came to America and to Monessen,” Jozwiak said. “We wanted to do something to celebrate the spirit of Polish history.”
The exhibit features many family photographs, Polish flags and banners, and other items from the Polish National Alliance, today known simply as the PNA hall on Knox Avenue.
Jozwiak said there were once several Polish fraternal lodges in the city where families could buy reduced-cost insurance.
The women agreed preparing the exhibit brought back many memories.
They all came from large families – a trait of many Polish parents.
The displays feature a traditional Polish Easter basket filled with a loaf of bread, traditional Polish outfits, hand-made wood carvings, an old-fashioned coffee grinder, Polish dolls, and Wozniak’s mother’s curling iron from 1920.
“This has brought a lot of tears and joy,” Wozniak said, adding her infant baptismal gown and bonnet are on display.
The exhibit also features several photos of unnamed people. They are hoping visitors can help identify them.
As Belczyk went through her family archives, she shed tears as she thought about her brothers, who all served in the Polish Army.
“We only spoke Polish so, when they want [sic] to war and wanted to give their confession, they had to do it in Polish,” she said. “The priest said that would be fine.”
Jozwiak and Belczyk still speak fluent Polish, but use it very rarely these days.
There was a time, though, when the nuns at the St. Hyacinth School taught them in their native language.
“We really learned to speak English by playing in the neighborhoods,” Belczyk said.
Babinski, who is married to Leonard Babinski, recalls the days when her mother-in-law, the late Mary Babinski, served as a mid-wife, delivering more than 3,000 babies in Monessen.
“She even delivered me and both of my children,” Babinski said.
Although Janol is a third-generation Polish American, she has tracked down relatives still living in Poland.
All of the women agree they would love to visit Poland some day but, for now, they are happy to show off their heritage at the museum.
For more information about the Monessen Heritage Museum, call (724) 684-8460.
From ArtDaily: Miroslaw Balka to Undertake Next Commission in The Unilever Series at Tate Modern
LONDON.- Tate and Unilever announced that the Polish artist Miroslaw Balka will undertake the tenth commission in The Unilever Series for the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern (13 October 2009 —“ 5 April 2010).
Born in Warsaw, Poland in 1958, Balka lives and works in Warsaw and Otwock. This will be the artist’s first public commission in the UK, which will be unveiled on Monday 12 October 2009. Miroslaw Balka is one of the most significant contemporary artists of his generation. His work has had critical acclaim both in this country and internationally. Comprising installation, sculpture and video, Balka’s works explore themes of personal history and common experience drawing on his Catholic upbringing and the fractured history of his native country, Poland. Intimate and self-reflective, his works demonstrate his central concerns of identifying personal memory within the context of historical memory.
In works such as Oasis (C.D.F.) (1989), he suggests a domestic setting in which the daily rituals of human existence are played out. Eating and sleeping, love and death are evoked using materials which have a particular resonance for Balka such as milk, wooden planks from his childhood home and pine needles salvaged from the tree that grew outside his window. In this work dedicated to the German Romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich, Balka invokes both the spiritual and the everyday.
Central to Balka’s work is the use of materials of humble quality such as ash, felt, soap, salt and hair to give a sense of spirituality through their association with lives lived and memories left behind. Salt, for example, alludes to human emotions in the form of sweat or tears, whilst soap evokes the intimate yet universal daily rituals of cleansing as explored in Hanging Soap Women (2000), in which used bars of soap donated by women are strung together on a wire. In the installation, 190 x 90 x 4973 (2008), Balka constructs a wooden walkway with walls measuring 190cm high (the artist’s height) without any ceiling and made from simple common building materials such as plywood, creating a claustrophobic tunnel with no visible destination.
Memorials play an important role in Polish society but also in Balka’s personal experience —“ his grandfather was a monumental stonemason and his father an engraver of tombstones. His early performances and sculpture referred to his experience of the rituals of Catholicism, perhaps made more intense in a country where religion was repressed…
I would love to see this. If we reflect on this work we see the underlying Catholic connection – the communion of saints, the Church triumphant. It is our connection, raw and closest to the heart, seen through eyes of faith, made beautiful.
For more information visit the Tate
Also from the Tate: Symbolism in Poland and Britain from 14 March to 21 June, 2009.
In the Albany, New York area check out the Polish Community Center, 225 Washington Ave Ext, Albany NY 12205 (call 518-456-3995) every Friday between February 27th and April 10th, 4-8pm for a tremendous fish fry. My family and I went last week. I literally felt like the Apostles had just dumped their nets full of fish on the table. The fish was tasty, with great fixins’ and a side of homemade sauerkraut salad. The service was personal and exceptional. They have Polish beers too — you can’t go wrong…
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer: Lent is here and that means it’s fish-fry season: Your local guide
St. Mary’s Polish National Catholic Church — 5375 Broadview Road, Parma, Ohio. 216-741-8154. 4-7 p.m. Fridays, March 13 through March 27. $8. Includes pierogi, slaw or applesauce, fries, bread and butter, coffee and dessert.
As BigSister28 noted in the comments section to the article: “St. Mary’s Polish National Catholic Church on Broadview Road has, without a doubt, the best pierogies. And the best homemade cupcakes for dessert.”
…and from the Standard-Speaker: Hometown happenings
A potato cake and soup sale will be held at Ss. Peter and Paul PNCC, Adams Street, McAdoo, Pennsylvania on every Friday during lent and the soups available include pasta fagoli, tomato, potato mushroom, vegetarian vegetable, macaroni and cheese and haluski. Advanced orders are appreciated, but walk-ins are welcome. For more information call 570-929-1250 or 570-929-1558.
Smacznego! Bon Appétit!
The Youth Culture House of Rybnik, Poland announces its 9th Annual international Art Competition on the theme “The Great Well-Known and Unknown.”
This year’s topic focuses on “Velázquez – The King’s painter and the Painters’ Prince”
The annual competition’s aims are:
Our journey has lasted for 9 years. Many of you have accompanied us from the beginning. Leaving Paris of the first half of XXth century behind, we move to VIIIth century Spain with presentations on Diego Velázquez, his life and creative output.
In his works, the great painter showed the wonderful, baroque, Spanish court, a society in an age full of contrast, the mysticism of religious ecstasy, the pathos of history, and the beauty of nature. This genius of art and intellect was an unequalled master of colour and the painter’s vision of reality. Loftiness alternates invariably with simplicity in his poetical paintings.
We expect that you present the places and historical epoch in which he worked, people whom he encountered and by whom he was befriended, his models, studios, teachers, patrons —“ everything he lived during his 61 years, passing from his modest beginning as a painter in Sevilla to his becoming an outstanding nobleman of Spanish court, and king’s painter.
Please do not copy the artist’s works. Rather, let them be an inspiration for your own works.
Participants aged 5 to 21 may enter in the following groupings:
Works may range from a minimum of 30 x 42 cm to a maximum of 70 x 100 cm
Works may be paintings, drawings, graphics, or mixed.
The deadline for entry is March 31st, 2009.
All works should be clearly signed on the back and should contain the following information:
Please do not frame works!
An awards ceremony and exhibition will take place on May 25th, 2009 in Rybnik, Poland.
The organisers will inform all the authors of awarded works by E-mail or telephone.
Works should be sent to:
MŁODZIEŻOWY DOM KULTURY
UL. BRONIEWSKIEGO 23
44 —“ 217 RYBNIK POLSKA
For more information please call: (032) 42 24 088, (032) 42 15 155 or E-mail the organizers.
The competition is organised under the honorary patronage of the mayor of Rybnik.
All the works can be sent back at the request of the institution and at its own expense within 10 months from the exhibition. After this period all the works will remain at the institution of the organizer.
MŁODZIEŻOWY DOM KULTURY W RYBNIKU
Serdecznie zaprasza do udziału w
IX EDYCJI KONKURSU —žWIELCY ZNANI I NIEZNANI—
Tegorocznym tematem jest: —žVELíZQUEZ —“ MALARZ KRí“Lí“W, KSIÄ„ŻÄ˜ MALARZY—
CELE:
TEMATYKA PRAC:
Nasza podróż po świecie trwa już od 9 lat. Część z Was towarzyszy nam od początku. Zostawiając w tyle Paryż z początku XX-wieku przenosimy się w tym roku do XVII-wiecznej Hiszpanii. Tym razem planujemy poznać i pokazać sylwetkę, życie i dorobek artystyczny Diego Velázqueza.
Wielki sewilczyk pokazał w swojej sztuce wspaniały barokowy dwór hiszpański, społeczeństwo epoki pełnej kontrastów, mistycyzm religijnych uniesień, patos historii i piękno przyrody. Ten geniusz sztuki i intelektu, Król Malarzy był niedoścignionym mistrzem koloru i malarskiego widzenia rzeczywistości. W jego poetyckich obrazach przeplatają się niezmienni wzniosłość i prostota.
Oczekujemy, że pokażecie miejsca i epokę historyczną, w której tworzył, ludzi z którymi się stykał i przyjaźnił, jego modeli, pracownie, nauczycieli, mecenasów —“ wszystko co przeżył na przestrzeni 61 lat przechodząc od skromnej pozycji sewilskiego malarza do wybitnego szlachcica hiszpańskiego dworu i nadwornego portrecisty króla.
NIE KOPIUJCIE OBRAZí“W ARTYSTY —“ niech pozostaną dla was wyłącznie inspiracją dla tworzenia własnych pięknych prac!!!
WIEK UCZESTNIKí“W: 5 —“ 21 LAT
Grupy wiekowe: (do 7 lat), (8-11 lat), (12-15 lat), (16-21 lat)
FORMAT PRAC: min. 30×42 cm – max 70×100 cm
TECHNIKA: malarstwo, rysunek, grafika, techniki mieszane (płaskie)
TERMIN DOSTARCZENIA PRAC: 31 marca 2009
Prace powinny być czytelnie opisane na odwrocie i zawierać następujące dane:
UROCZYSTE PODSUMOWANIE KONKURSU, ROZDANIE NAGRí“D WYRí“ŻNIEŁƒ I DYPLOMí“W ORAZ OTWARCIE WYSTAWY POKONKURSOWEJ ODBĘDZIE SIĘ 25 MAJA 2009
WSZYSCY LAUREACI ZOSTANÄ„ POWIADOMIENI PRZEZ ORGANIZATORA LISTOWNIE LUB TELEFONICZNIE.
Adres:
MŁODZIEŻOWY DOM KULTURY
UL. BRONIEWSKIEGO 23,
44-217 RYBNIK, Polska
tel. 0-32 4215155, fax: 0-32 4224088,
E-mail
Konkurs pod HONOROWYM PATRONATEM PREZYDENTA MIASTA RYBNIKA
Prace nadesłane na konkurs będą mogły być odebrane na wyraźne życzenie i koszt placówki w przeciągu 10 miesięcy od zakończenia wystawy. Po tym czasie wszystkie prace przechodzą na własność organizatora.
From the Times Leader Good eats! column:
Pierogi Sale, sponsored by Church of the Good Shepherd, Polish National Catholic Church, 278 East Main St., Plymouth, Pennsylvania. One dozen with potato and cheese filling cost $7 and will be sold this Sunday and Sunday, March 8th. Farmer’s cheese filling will be sold only on Sunday, March 22nd for $8.50 per dozen. Place orders by calling (570) 779-4781. Pickup orders from 3-5 p.m. in the church auditorium in the rear of the church.
The Polish Cultural Institute and the Performance Studies Department of the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University are presenting Tracing Grotowski’s Path: Year of Grotowski in New York starting February 6 and continuing through July 13, 2009. The program is curated by Professor Richard Schechner.
Tracing Grotowski’s Path: Year of Grotowski in New York celebrates the work and legacy of world-renowned Polish theatre director Jerzy Grotowski.
Considered one of the most important and influential theatre practitioners of the 20th century, Grotowski revolutionized contemporary theatre in a number of ways. Beginning in 1959 with his early experiments and productions in the Polish town of Opole and subsequently with the Polish Laboratory Theatre in Wrocław, Grotowski changed the way Western theatre practitioners and performance theorists conceive of the audience/actor relationship, theatre staging, and the craft of acting. UNESCO has designated 2009 as —The Year of Grotowski— —“ 50 years after the founding of the Polish Laboratory Theatre and 10 after the death of the world-renowned Polish theatre director,
The opening program: The Theatre of Thirteen Rows (1959) and the Frotowski Institute in Wrocław (2009) will take place on Friday, February 6, 2009, 7:30pm at the Cantor Film Center, 36 East 8th Street, New York, NY
This event brings together former literary director and co-founder of the Theatre of Thirteen Rows (later the Polish Laboratory Theatre), Ludwik Flaszen and the current directing team of the Grotowski Institute in Wrocław, Poland: Jarosław Fret and Grzegorz Ziolkowski. What brought the Polish Laboratory Theatre into existence? What was the Polish theatre scene like in those days of the Cold War and the Iron Curtain? What is the current work of the Grotowski Institute? How is the Institute preserving, researching, and using Grotowski’s archives and his Polish heritage? The panel discussion, moderated by Richard Schechner, will be preceded by a screening of a film on Jerzy Grotowski. The event will conclude at 11:00 PM.