In 2010, the Chopin birth bicentenary year, Warsaw is to have a new-look Chopin Museum. An international competition for its design and exhibition concept has been won by the Milan-based Migliore&Servetto company.
Michał Kubicki reports
Warsaw has had a Chopin Museum since the mid-1950s. It is located in the Ostrogski Castle, a Baroque structure that was destroyed during World War Two and rebuilt from scratch. It currently undergoes a major refurbishment and when the project is completed it will serve as the venue for a permanent exhibition documenting Chopin’s life and work arranged in line with the latest concepts in design and presentation.
An international competition for the new-look Chopin Museum in Warsaw has generated worldwide interest. The shortlist comprised 32 companies from Austria, Denmark, Greece, Switzerland, Holland, Great Britain, Italy, Germany and Poland. A panel of judges, chaired by the prominent Polish Chopin scholar, Irena Poniatowska, included famous artists and museum directors from Vienna and London. First Prize, and 50, 000 euros in cash, went to Migliore&Servetto of Milan.
Grzegorz Michalski, the director of the National Chopin Institute, says it was an excellent choice: 'The Italian concept is renowned for its incredible artistic taste and a feel for the specific conditions of the Ostrogski Castle on the one hand and of the needs of a monographic exhibition devoted to Chopin. I am delighted with a clarity of vision and the logic of the structural design.'
The winning project does away with the traditional ‘don’t touch the exhibits’ way of design. It is to be a multi-media and interactive arrangement, making profound use of all the latest in electronic technology.
‘While being a truly modern museum, it is addressed not only to the lovers of Chopin but to people of various level of interest in music and of all age groups, both 70- and 10-year olds. They will be able to view different exhibits, the ones they are interested in, at the same time; it’s a very interesting concept,’ said the minister of culture Bogdan Zdrojewski.
Music critic Aleksander Laskowski hopes that the Chopin Museum in Warsaw will be one of the most interesting museums of its kind in the world: ‘The chances are very strong that we’ll have a cutting-edge music with a perfect combination of the traditional and the contemporary. Visitors will have access to the actual artifacts and on the other hand the artifacts will be surrounded by state-of-the-art technology, including zoom-in technology. What is also very important is that we have the very traditional architecture [of the Ostrogski Castle] that has to be filled in with the traditional exhibits and modern technology. I think it’s very difficult to combine the two. The Italians won the competition because they were very successful in that and we can hope for the best.’
The opening of the Museum in 2010 is to be one of the highlights of the Chopin Year observed by the whole musical world. They will include the Chopin International Competition in the autumn of that year.