Warsaw. Exhibition about winter from years ago at Fotoplastikon Warszawski

White Aleje Ujazdowskie, skaters spinning pirouettes on the frozen pond in Łazienki, city services bravely fighting meter-high snowdrifts on the streets, stalls with Christmas decorations at Haly Mirowskie… It used to be winters!

Until December 30, at Fotoplastikon Warszawski you can see what winter was like in Warsaw in the 1920s and 1930s. Real, frosty, snowy, before climate changes, which caused it to be bitten by spring on the one hand and absorbed by autumn on the other. “In 48 photographs of the pre-war capital, we will recall what the winter months looked like almost a hundred years ago,” say the organizers.

Snow fighting, Christmas shopping

Let's look at a few of them. The plow on Krakowskie Przedmieście paves the way for a few cars, but also for trams that still ran along the Royal Route in the 1930s. In another photo from the same area, from the same truck, workers are shoveling snow into a sewer manhole. What transport looked like at that time can also be seen in the photo from Aleje Ujazdowskie: one car has just stopped on the track, a sleigh is rushing next to it, and three similar sleighs are in the background. More snorting horses than mechanical ones. In the background there is an electric car, a tram of course.

Christmas tree sales point at Piłsudskiego Square 1. A man in a hat holds a briefcase in one hand and a children's sleigh in the other. A few meters in front of him was an impatient woman (wife?). And him? He would probably like to visit the bar in the corner of the Europejski Hotel.

The nearby Iron Gate Square was full of trade – after all, it was the shopping center of Warsaw at that time. The stalls display mainly Christmas decorations. The photo from December 1935 is of good quality – you can read the emotions on the faces, and the content of the advertisements on the walls: BUTTER – CHEESE. LITHUANIAN DUTCH TRAPISTS. Wide selection.

The next photo shows spruces and snow, a lot of snow. We can only trust the organizers of the exhibition, who describe it as “Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie. January 1933”.

Pre-war photography in 3D

Photoplasticons are machines constructed over 100 years ago, used to present stereoscopic photos. There are viewfinders in the machine's casing for viewing moving photos. Viewers look at photographs in three dimensions. One cycle (rotation of the drum inside the machine) is a display of 24 double photos.

Photoplasticons appeared at city fairs, fairs and entertainment salons, but also in pubs. There were at least eight such permanent locations in Warsaw between 1899 and 1914. What's unique about Aleje Jerozolimskie is that it has been located in the same tenement house since the mid-1940s. It was in private hands for several dozen years, and for several dozen years it has been taken care of by the Warsaw Uprising Museum. Fotoplastikon Warszawski is a branch of this institution.

The exhibition “In the embrace of frost, or pre-war Warsaw in its winter version” at Fotoplastikon Warszawski (Aleje Jerozolimskie 51) is open every day except Tuesdays from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. until December 30.