Modernism. Architecture of Poland and Italy 1918-1943 Poznań

Majestic, monumental, revealing the power and might of authority. This is precisely what architecture in the 1920s and 1930s looked like. But do we realize the story behind their creation, location, and appearance?

Photographer Michał Łukasik invites us on a journey through Józef Piłsudski’s Poland and Benito Mussolini’s Italy. This series is the result of the photographer’s several-year journey following the footsteps of modernist architecture in Poland and Italy. Łukasik juxtaposes Polish and Italian examples of educational, government, public, cultural, sports, and residential buildings.

By juxtaposing photographs of various cities and buildings, he highlights the differences, but also the similarities, in the architecture of both countries. Let’s look at Poland and Italy from a slightly different perspective. Often, while traversing even the most touristy trails, we don’t realize that among the churches and palaces dating back centuries, or even millennia, lie leading representatives of modernism.

If we go beyond the boundaries of the historic districts, we discover a completely different history of the city. We’ll encounter individual buildings, entire districts, and perhaps even entire modernist cities built from scratch. Such „young” cities include Gdynia in Poland and Littorie (now Latine) in Italy.