Reopening the Best of the Polish Poster School: The Wilanów Poster Museum in Warsaw

fot_bartosz_bajerski_muzeum_narodowe_w_warszawie_2.jpg, default, View from the permanent exhibition ‘Polish Posters: The Collection’ in the Wilanów Poster Museum, 12 March 2026, photo: Bartosz Bajerski / National Mu

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Opened in 1968, the Poster Museum in Wilanów in Warsaw was the world’s first institution of its kind. After being closed for renovation for several years, the museum, now boasting a permanent exhibition, opened its door once again to visitors on 14th March 2026.

The establishment of the Poster Museum in Warsaw in the 1960s was a remarkable event for a few reasons. First, the decision to create an independent institution devoted to a practice that wasn’t yet considered a legitimate art form was a revolutionary one at the time. The creation of the first such establishment in the world contributed to the artistic legitimacy of poster art and an increased understanding of the medium’s value, as well as to the development and global recognition of the International Poster Biennale, held beginning in 1966.

Finally, another notable thing was the significant role of women in the creation of the museum. Although both the milieu of poster artists and that of their supporters were generally male-dominated, we owe the birth of the remarkable Polish institution to Janina Fijałkowska, a curator of the National Museum. Male dominance was also undermined on the architectural front, with Halina Kossuth designing the Poster Museum building – In a bold gesture, she incorporated a contemporary gallery pavilion into the context of the historic Baroque palace integrating modernist architecture with a relic of 19th-century historicism.

Print matters

Posters, information sheets, and advertising leaflets designed to circulate in the public space began to appear on European streets as early as the beginning of the 18th century. The development of this practice was closely connected to increasingly modernised printing techniques, which is why this branch of graphic design started to boom in the 19th century and peaked in the mid-20th. While a large number of posters was authored by acclaimed artists (such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Alphonse Mucha, Gustav Klimt, Stanisław Wyspiański, Teodor Axentowicz, Zofia Stryjeńska, Henryk Berlewi, Mieczysław Szczuka), these works didn’t enjoy a high status as such and weren’t included in the artistic canon. The disputes as to whether poster design ought to be considered an art has accompanied the field ever since its emergence. Listed as arguments against were, for example, the commercial, often utilitarian character of the designs as well as their easy reproduction and mass production.

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The poster ‘Amnestji dla Więźniów Politycznych’ (We Demand Amnesty for All Political Prisoners) by Mieczysław Szczuka, 1926, photo: Wikimedia Commons

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Similar discussions were also underway in Poland, with their intensity peaking immediately after World War II, when, faced with the government-imposed doctrine of socialist realism, graphic design circles began to conceive of ideas for a new language that poster art could employ. In the 1950s – a decade in which the influence of politics on art was particularly strong – designers, aiming to circumvent the confines of socialist realism, started to introduce solutions previously absent from poster design, such as abbreviations, allusions, departures from literal representation, and an increased individuality of styles. Owing to these formal changes, the appeal of the poster as a medium increased. It became a subject of art criticism and moved from the streets into gallery rooms. And so, in June 1953, the 1st National Poster Exhibition took place at the Zachęta Gallery in Warsaw. As the historian of Polish poster art Katarzyna Matul demonstrates, one of the key events marking these developments was the 2nd National Exhibition of Illustration, Poster and Small Graphic Forms, which was held in the spring of 1955 in the same gallery and at which posters in particular came to occupy a special place. In her book Legitymizacja Artystyczna Plakatu w PRL 1944–1968 (The Artistic Legitimation of the Poster in the People’s Republic of Poland, 1944–1968), the researcher writes:

It was then that the poster became a favourite subject for exhibitions – and these were being held all around the country, featuring posters on cultural and political themes; local, Polish, and foreign ones; with exhibits located in the open air, in galleries, in different branches of the Art Exhibitions Office, art and history museums, as well as in the lobbies of town halls, institutions, even tourist offices […].

Poster art meets modernity

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Graphic artist Julian Pałka at the 2nd International Poster Biennale, Zachęta – National Gallery of Art, organised by the Poster Museum in Wilanów, Warsaw, photo: Jan Morek / Polish Press Agency (PAP)

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The 1950s and 1960s marked a period of numerous artistic and political transformations in the field of poster art. In the 1960s, the formal changes and the new language developed during the times of socialist realism led to the emergence of a phenomenon now globally known as the Polish Poster School. In 1968, thanks to the efforts of people like Józef Mroszczak and Henryk Tomaszewski, the independent Faculty of Graphic Arts was established at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw. Not only did the field’s prestige increase as a result, but new opportunities to educate on the subject were created. Among those who had been emphasising the significance of poster design for years, an idea was born to hold an international poster art review and competition. One of the aims that inspired the initiators of the event was to confront the forms and accomplishments of the Polish Poster School with the works of foreign artists. Consequently, in 1966, the 1st International Poster Biennale was inaugurated at the Zachęta Gallery.

An accumulation of various political and artistic phenomena, combined with the efforts of artists, critics and curators, made the 1960s a period of great upheaval in Polish poster art. In this atmosphere, an idea germinated to create a specialist institution devoted especially to this medium. The plan was born in the mind of Janina Fijałkowska, the curator of the Poster Section in the Contemporary Graphic Art Department of the National Museum in Warsaw. As a museologist, Fijałkowska understood that for every art form, the act of studying, researching, curating and conservatorship are no less important than the presentation and popularising of the artists’ accomplishments. The first step on this path was the establishment, by the decision of the National Museum director Stanisław Lorentz, of the Poster Section, which featured, for instance, a collection of 500 pre-war works rescued during World War II. (The collection expanded so quickly that in 1967, it encompassed as many as 13,000 posters.) It was placed in Fijałkowska’s custody. During that time, a section of the museum’s collections was temporarily moved to Wilanów Palace, since the storage of the National Museum couldn’t contain all the exhibits in its possession. To remedy the situation, Wojciech Fijałkowski, the director of the palace at the time (and privately the husband of the Poster Section’s custodian), made several rooms available just for this purpose. Additionally, in June 1963, Fijałkowska organised a conference focusing on these artworks held at the palace, during which she characterised the collection while simultaneously emphasising the need to ensure the proper conditions for the storage, preservation and exposition of the pieces.

Posters enter the museum

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Bird’s eye view of the Wilanów Palace from the side of the Przyczółkowa Street. On the right: Wilanów Poster Museum with farmland in the background, 1975, photo: National Digital Archives NAC

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‘Credit for the establishment of the museum is due to its chief custodian Janina Fijałkowska: her extraordinary energy, enormous power, and unwavering determination,’ Stanisław Lorentz reportedly said of his collaborator at the opening of the Poster Museum. The grounds of the Baroque palace at Wilanów were chosen as the new institution’s location. At the time, the building had already been reconstructed after being destroyed during wartime. However, the expansive area of the former royal residence still encompassed some unused grounds in the 1960s. One of them was a former 19th-century riding hall, located in the southern part of the complex. Its construction was initiated by the then-owner Aleksander Potocki, who, in the years 1845–1855, commissioned an extension and reconstruction of the buildings located on the palace grounds, undertaken by Franciszek Maria Lanci. Among the set of buildings comprising a riding hall, coachhouse and dog kennel, it was the facade of the main structure that survived World War II in the best condition – all the other parts were destroyed, either partly or completely. Consequently, when the decision was made to locate the Poster Museum in this very place, the project had to take into consideration the historic, 19th-century facade.

The construction was overseen by Jacek Cydzik, a general designer in charge of the reconstruction of the park and palace complex at Wilanów, while the museum building itself was designed by Halina Kossuth in collaboration with the design engineer Adam Pulikowski.

Kossuth described her experience in the pages of the monthly magazine Architektura (Architecture):

The lack of iconographic data regarding the ‘Riding Hall’ building precluded its full reconstruction. So, the designer was faced with a serious problem in need of a solution, since the new function required a contemporary composition, in accordance with the object’s new purpose. Consequently, the designer had to combine historic and contemporary architecture. The effect was a complex of historic and new buildings linked by a common purpose and serving as component parts of the Poster Museum.

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The Wilanów Poster Museum in Warsaw, photo: Adam Stępień / AW

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As a result, the complex comprised a contemporary museum building fronted by a historic facade as well as a new administration building. Moreover, some preserved relics of the former buildings were assigned new functions: with the dog kennel turned into the vestibule of the office part and one of the coachhouses turned into storage. Kossuth reported that ‘[w]hat posed the fundamental difficulty was the task of harmoniously combining forms of old, historic architecture and contemporary ones, as well as employing new structural solutions while retaining what we inherited from the past epoch, integrating all into a coherent, functional whole.’ The preserved facade, designed by Lanci, boasts an eye-catching, classicist-style form. It’s a gateway veneered with stone, featuring protrudent cornices, a triangular cresting, and a door closed with a semi-circular arc, backed by a curtain wall framed by two hefty pylons. Fronting the entryway are two figures of horses raised on tall plinths.

Tailor-made interior

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Wilanów Poster Museum, 1969, Warsaw, photo: Afa Pixx / Mirosław Stankiewicz / Polish Press Agency (PAP)

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The conditions the museum required were quite particular: an open space, dispersed light, light colours. So, behind the historic facade, Kossuth placed a pavilion supported by a ferro-concrete frame, with a large hall provided with maximum daylight thanks to glazed panels in its saw-tooth roof. A mezzanine surrounded the interior, expanding the exhibition space, and leading up to the mezzanine was a spiral staircase, which the architect incorporated in order to relieve the otherwise simple rhythm of vertical and horizontal lines. She wrote in Architektura:

Hues of white, black and grey dominate the exhibition hall. The white of the ceiling and the walls; the black of the marble staircases and windowsills; and the grey of the floors made of pre-fabricated marble slabs, combined with the aluminium framing of the glass wall, which provides a spectacular view of the brilliant green of the park; all these elements compose an appropriate background that brings out the colours of the posters.

On 4 June 1968, in the light, modernist interior of the Poster Museum, two inaugural exhibitions were opened to the public. One featured works by the winners of the 1st International Poster Biennale: Jan Lenica, Kazumas Nagai and Hiroshi Tanaki. The other showcased posters designed by Wojciech Zamecznik, who had died just a year earlier.

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Exhibition featuring works of the winners of the 4th International Poster Biennale in the Wilanów Poster Museum, 1976, photo: Jan Morek / Polish Press Agency (PAP)

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Although the opening of the museum marked the culmination of poster art’s journey towards being recognised as a legitimate art form, some artists, such as Jan Lenica, called these efforts into question. According to the project’s critics, the proper place for posters is on the streets. After all, posters are made with public spaces in mind – when admired in silence and deep focus in white gallery rooms, rather than among the hustle and bustle of the city, they lose their purpose and meaning. Nevertheless, the opening of the museum was an important event, one on a global scale. Nowadays, there are few institutions of this kind. Not only that, but the poster itself attained a status equal to that of painting or sculpture, becoming an art form that requires museum care, conservation and documentation.

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Exhibition hall, Wilanów Poster Museum in Warsaw in the year 2016, photo: Agata Grzybowska / AW

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In 1993, exhibits from the subsequent editions of the International Poster Biennale were moved from Zachęta to the Poster Museum. (Starting in 2018, the International Poster Biennale has been hosted by the Academy of Fine Art.) It was then that the decision was made to expand the exhibition space. The designer Ludwika Borawska adapted one of the storage areas to the needs of the gallery and installed 15 aluminium pillars in the main exhibition hall. Suspended from the ceiling, lean, sharpened towards the bottom, they were meant to hold a mesh stretched across the room on which posters could be hung. Light and narrow, they didn’t disrupt the sense of open space, block the light, or impede movement around the hall.

Showcasing history

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View from the permanent exhibition ‘Polish Posters: The Collection’ in the Wilanów Poster Museum, 12 March 2026, photo: Bartosz Bajerski / National Museum in Warsaw

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The Poster Museum in Wilanów was temporarily closed in 2022 to undergo renovations, which the building needed after 50 years of continuous use. Utility systems required modernisations so that the artworks stored and exhibited there could remain safe from the perspective of conservation. Additionally, the interior was made more accessible to patrons with special needs. However, another, more substantial change was introduced as well. Up until now, the museum had only featured temporary exhibitions, but starting from its reopening on 14 March 2026, visitors can view an extensive permanent exposition presenting the story of Polish poster art from its birth in the 19th century through to the present day. The team of custodians responsible for the concept behind the exhibition Polish Posters: The Collection (Izabela Iwanicka-Dzierżawska, Mariusz Knorowski, Aleksandra Oleksiak, Bożena Pysiewicz and Michał Warda) aimed to demonstrate how posters ‘told the story of Poland’ throughout the years, accompanying daily life on city streets. ‘The works showcased in the Poster Museum at Wilanów are visual signs of their times,’ inform the curators of the exhibition, which, alongside posters tackling the subjects of history, political propaganda and social issues, features those devoted to film, theatre, fashion and advertising.

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‘Moore’ by Henryk Tomaszewski, a poster for an exhibition of sculptures by Henry Moore, 1959, Central Art Exhibitions Office ‘Zachęta’, Warsaw Printing Company, Warsaw, photo: Wilanów Poster Museum

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Visitors can admire the most recognisable Polish posters, such as:

the 1898 work by Teodor Axentowicz announcing the 2nd Exhibition of the Polish Artists Society ‘Art’;
one advertising Zakopane;
Stefan Norblin’s 1925 project;
Tadeusz Trepkowski’s 1952 anti-war poster Nie! (No!);
Jan Młodożeniec’s famous Cyrk (Circus) from 1959;
Aleksandra Jasionowska’s 2016 Strajk Kobiet (Women’s Strike);
and Paweł Jońca’s 2022 work Russian Bear.

The museum also has the well-known interwar posters with the slogan ‘Sugar invigorates’ (‘Cukier krzepi’) coined by Melchior Wańkowicz, as well as the emblematic work by Tomasz Sarnecki encouraging participation in the 1989 elections (the first partly-democratic elections in post-war Poland), featuring the ‘Solidarity’ logo designed by Jerzy Janiszewski. Finally, with the opening of the museum post-renovation, a new educational space has been put into use to host an educational programme accompanying the exhibition.

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View from the permanent exhibition ‘Polish Posters: The Collection’ in the Wilanów Poster Museum, 12 March 2026, photo: Bartosz Bajerski / National Museum in Warsaw

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However, the permanent exhibition at the Poster Museum will… keep changing. As the curators explain, works on paper substrate require special treatment: they cannot be exposed to sunlight for too long, and have to be kept in rooms where proper temperature and air humidity can be maintained. For this reason, once every three months, the exhibition will temporarily close, a break during which each poster on show will be replaced by another. Owing to that, the pieces – which we have already recognised as proper museum exhibits – will be protected from the detrimental impact of external conditions.

Houses, not pencils

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View from the permanent exhibition ‘Polish Posters: The Collection’ in the Wilanów Poster Museum, 12 March 2026, photo: Bartosz Bajerski / National Museum in Warsaw

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The team of designers responsible for the new spatial arrangement of the exhibition included Filip Tofil, Urszula Tofil (Syfon Studio) and Łukasz Izert (Izert Studio) / PROLOG. As the artists themselves tell it, they aimed to recreate the atmosphere of the street – after all, the streets are what the posters were originally made for. However, the high, hefty partition walls and ‘little houses’ with sloping roofs that fill the building have ended up completely obscuring Halina Kossuth’s architectural concept of an open-spaced, luminous interior sectioned by the mezzanine. Even the colour pattern, so meticulously conceived by the architect, has been disrupted, as the arcades of the mezzanine have been painted black.

The building, once painstakingly tailored to the needs of this particular institution, has been treated like a mere package devoid of its own aesthetic qualities, and consequently filled with an exhibition that in no way connects to its architectural surroundings. It’s quite a pity – after all, Ludwika Borawska’s design for an expanded exposition space, implemented in the 1990s, proved that it is possible to change and develop the museum while respecting the architecture in which it’s embedded.

As Matul emphasises, the Poster Museum was never meant to imitate the ‘natural environment’ in which these works were first presented. The founders of the institution understood very well that what they were undertaking was an avant-garde project, elevating poster design to the rank of an art while also creating new circumstances for, and a new mode of, engaging with posters. From the very beginning, they assumed that the museum’s manner of showcasing works would be an innovative one – just like the building itself is contemporary yet also inscribed into the Baroque conception and connected to the classicist facade. ‘It was not just the architecture of the building and the poster as a museum object that testified to the contemporary nature of the Poster Museum. The scenography of the exhibitions provided another proof,’ wrote Matul. In her book, she recounts the opening exhibition, which demonstrates how these ideas were incorporated:

What added splendour to the inauguration was a music performance inspired by the museum’s architecture, composed by Zygmunt Krauze. The experimental piece, along with the sculptures, placed in the inner courtyard, by contemporary artists Magdalena Więcek, Jerzy Jarnuszkiewicz and Marian Bogusz, demonstrate that the museum as conceived of by the organisers was meant to become a vibrant place, cultivating ties to contemporary art in its various guises.

It seems that this particular element of the idea behind the Poster Museum hasn’t been incorporated into its present-day iteration.

Originally written in Polish, translated by Anna Potoczny, March 2026

Sources: Katarzyna Matul, Legitymizacja Artystyczna Plakatu w PRL 1944-1968 (Artistic Legitimation of the Poster in People’s Republic of Poland 1944–1968), Kraków 2025; Bożena Pysiewicz, ‘Poster Museum at Wilanów: Title Winner of Architectural Vice-Mister of Warsaw and World Precursor of Museum Poster Collections’, National Museum in Warsaw, 3 June 2022, https://cyfrowe.mnw.art.pl/en/essays/353; Bożena Pysiewicz, ‘Janina Fijałkowska: Twórczyni Pierwszego na Świecie Muzeum Plakatu’ (Janina Fijałkowska: Founder of World’s First Poster Museum), National Museum in Warsaw, https://cyfrowe.mnw.art.pl/pl/eseje/580; Dorota Parszewska, ‘Muzeum Plakatu w Wilanowie: Geneza, Forma i Funkcja’ (Poster Museum at Wilanów: Origin, Form, and Function), [in:] Posters from the Poster Museum at Wilanów Collection, edited by Maria Kurpika and Agata Szydłowska, National Museum in Warsaw, 2008; Halina Kossuth, ‘Muzeum Plakatu w Wilanowie’ (Poster Museum at Wilanów), [in:] Architektura (Architecture), 1969, issue 1.

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