Ester’s Willow. History and future of a willow from Chrzanów

  • Time & Date 26.06.2021 / 15:00
  • Location Galicia Jewish Museum | 18 Dajwór St., Kraków
  • Original language PL/EN

    In English with Polish translation

Artists Marta Sala and Robert Yerachmiel Sniderman introduce a long-distance video project and public ritual in Chrzanów, where they are organizing a local collective to re-plant a white willow tree in the former Esther’s Square, the location of the Great Synagogue of Chrzanów until its demolition in the 1970s.
Marta’s family has lived on the square for three generations. Planted around the time of the synagogue’s demolition, in 2018 Marta witnessed the cutting down of the old white willow, which to her had quietly memorialized the eradicated Jewish community on its own nonhuman terms.
Sala and Sniderman are working from within the everyday situation of memory in the city, the fruits and challenges of their distance and difference, and the traditional use of the white willow for pain and fever relief, enriching the growth of other plant life, and facilitating grief. In this event, Marta and several others from the collective will present and reflect on the first stages of this year-long process.
Partners
Funding