Members of Poland’s arts community have cautiously greeted the results of Sunday’s parliamentary elections, which are expected to result in the right-wing government being toppled from power.
The ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party received 35.4% of the vote, failing to form a majority in the Polish parliament. Instead, a wide range of opposition parties will now try to form a coalition to run the country, led by Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition, which came in second with 30.7%.
With PiS often accused of taking an ideologically driven approach to culture, many cultural figures are relieved that the party appears to have failed to secure an unprecedented third term in office.
Jakub Dąbrowski, professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, explains: “Certainly the art scene is made up of people who support PiS, but those who don’t, and they are the majority, are relieved. People are full of hope and pride as voter turnout has reached almost 75% and the democratic legitimacy of the opposition is remarkably strong.”
Nevertheless, says Dąbrowski, the opposition’s “somewhat exotic conglomerate of left-wing and moderately conservative parties” will face “many challenges in the cultural field.” Dąbrowski expresses his opposition to a politically motivated purge of PiS-appointed arts leaders, adding: “Culture must again be managed by experts and the basis for relations between state and culture should be based on a substantive assessment and not on the ideological agenda of a human being.” Governing party.”
Maria Anna Potocka, the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Krakow (MOCAK), takes a less optimistic line, saying that while there is hope in the expectation that an opposition-led PiS government will take such an interventionist approach, the General, will not follow Lack of political interest in culture remains a “curse of Poland”.
Jarosław Suchan, the former director of the Sztuki Museum in Łodz, who was fired by the PiS government, says: “The period of PiS rule will not be fondly remembered by most cultures.” Suchan points out that the Government has spent more on culture than its predecessors, but argues that the money was “selectively spent on events and institutions that are in line with PiS’s ideological line”. He adds that “a progressive, experimental culture, open to all diversity, could only emerge thanks to the support of local governments and private funds.” Furthermore, wages in the cultural sector still remained very low despite the high government spending on culture.”
“For all these reasons,” says Suchan, “the cultural community welcomes the upcoming political changes, but without the illusion that everything will be immediately fixed and everything will immediately get better.” We still have a long way to go and As a community, we cannot passively wait for events to unfold.”
At the political level, the path to a new government now lies in the hands of Polish President Andrzej Duda, who could first give the PiS a chance to form a government before turning to Tusk and his opposition colleagues.