Szary Dom w kontekście badań interdyscyplinarnych

Abstract

THE GREY HOUSE IN THE CONTEXT OF INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH

A subject that was many a time raised during the work on the script for the commemoration of KL Plaszow camp is the experience of emptiness. Few traces of the past survive within the post-camp space, and these include numerous land transformations, architectural relics of Jewish cemeteries and camp buildings, as well as remnants of camp infrastructure. The only exception is the one building that survives intact within the area of commemoration, namely the Grey House. The goal of this paper is to present the architectural and functional transformations of that building, reconstructed on the basis of the research conducted during the work on the said script. The text as a whole has also been enriched by reflections on the role of the Grey House as part of the Museum-Memorial Site KL Plaszow. The paper is divided into two parts. The first part chronologically discusses the building’s functional transformation sand its architectural changes. To reach that goal, the authors used the outcomes of preliminary source research, including visual material, such as plans, photographs, and drawings. These were complemented by an analysis of witnesses’ accounts and postwar documents. On the basis of this information, the building’s history was divided into three stages, according to the functions it performed. The first stage began with the building’s construction as part of the new Jewish cemetery complex established in Podgórze by the Jewish Community in Kraków. The building was designed by Adolf Siódmak (1879–1944). Its original function was to house the cemetery’s administration offces and the living quarters of its staff members, as well as the seat of the Chevra Kadisha burial society.It was probably already during the preliminary works on the construction of the camp that some alterations of the house itself were carried out: the attic was adapted by the addition of dormers, and the loggias on the western side were bricked up. In September 1943 a remand prison wasset up in the basement of the Grey House. The basement contained general cells, as well as standing cells (bunkers, Pol. stójki, Ger. Stehenbunker). The jail was used for the detention of camp inmates to whom regulatory punishments were applied, as well as persons who were brought to the camp from the outside, including those awaiting execution.Once the area had been taken over by the Soviet army, the Grey House once again started to be used for purposes similar to its former function during the existence of the camp, and it also served as an internal prison. At the end of the1940s, the beginning of the 1950s the building was converted into living quarters. In that period the interiors and the basement were partially altered, and balconies were added above the main entrance (these were removed after 2010).The house was used as a residential building until 2017. The second part of the paper discusses the outcomes of documentary and inventorial works, architectural, conservationand archaeological research conducted in the Grey House and its immediate vicinity from 2017 onward. Here, the building’s authentic remains, its form and relics are presented. Further on, the authors discuss the methods and results of inventorial works which focused on documenting the notices, drawings and inscriptions that survive in the former jail cells in the building. In the conclusion the authors write about the assumptions pertaining to the function of the Grey House building as part of the planned commemoration project. The paper is supplemented by anappendix containing a table which presents the outcomes of documentary research conducted in the basement of the former jail.