Alphabet – a performance at the 16th International Theatre Festival in Poznan, July 2006

An extraordinary performance and art installation in the former synagogue building in Poznan – now a municipal swimming pool – drew a large audience of young people keen to learn about Judaism and the Polish-Jewish heritage, which remained obscured for several decades during the Communist era.

Alphabet by the artist Janusz Marciniak was an awe-inspiring luminous installation of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet reflected in the pool’s surface. The installation was accompanied by the eminent actor Alexander Machalica reading from Piotr Rawicz’s book Blood from the Sky, and reciting Psalms 83 and 25, and El Male Rachamim. The darkness of the echoing building illuminated only by the Hebrew letters and yahrzeit candles. This site-specific event made a fitting contribution and rebuke to the debates which have been raging in the national press about the future of this synagogue desecrated by the Nazis during World War II. Some voices have called for the demolition of the building, while others campaign for the transformation of the site into a cultural centre for dialogue and tolerance.

Earlier installations by Janusz Marciniak, who is a professor at the Poznan Academy of Fine Arts, include Atlantide, a floating luminous Star of David and 9.09.1939 which recreated the constellation of stars above the synagogue on the day when the last Sabbath morning services were held there.

Alphabet was sponsored by a grant from the European Association for Jewish Culture

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