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Zwierzęta na fotografiach ze zbiorów Muzeum Krakowa

Abstrakt

BETWEEN THE OBJECT AND THE SUBJECT. ANIMALS IN THE PHOTOGRAPHS FROM THE COLLECTIONS OF THE MUSEUM OF KRAKÓW

The present paper oers a reection on the subject of the presence of animals in the photographs in the collections of the Museum of Kraków. Relations between people and animals are an extremely popular subject in our contemporary world. Our interest in animals has been rising astronomically in recent years. Museums and art galleriesdo not shun this subject, and readily decide to organize exhibitions dedicated to animal themes. Every time an exhibition of this sort is launched, it draws a large social response, at the same time resonating among new groups of museum exhibition goers. In recent years, a_new academic field has also evolved: animal studies, also defined as the study of human-animal relations (human-animal studies). The general assumption is to look at the question of animals from the perspective of dierent academic fields – not only biology, but also philosophy, history, anthropology, and psychology, while at the same time deanthropomorphizing these fields in the context of talking about animals. Reection on the presence of animals in the photographs held in the collections of the Museum of Kraków seems quite indispensable in the present, special issue of the Krzysztofory  yearbook, speci_cally dedicated to the medium of photography. It is worth to mention that animals as a research problem were introduced in the exhibition space of the Museum of Kraków already in 2016, in the form of a_temporary exhibition titled Jak pies z kotem [Like cat and dog], where animal motifs were presented for the first time in the Museum’s history. The collection of animal photographs at the Museum of Kraków contains atelier portraits, documentary photographs, reportorial views taken in the streets of Kraków, as well as ama teur photographs that constitute a kind of family chronicle and genre scenes showing views of the city and its surroundings. The basic criterion for the exhibition selection was the presence of an animal in the picture, therefore the discussed group of images covers the period from the 19th through the beginning of the 21st centuries. For the purposes of the present article, the photographs have been divided into several subgroups, in accordance with the species criterion, from cats and dogs, to horses, to the special category of wild animals living in the city, such as pigeons and squirrels. Due to their specific character, photographs from the Kraków Zoological Garden, and those associated with animal care are discussed separately.