Keeping heritage alive
In the middle of the square in the small Slovakian town of Banska Szczawnica stands an 18th century sculpture of the Holy Mary surrounded by winged cherubs and pillars.
Look closely at one of the cherubs, and you'll notice it bears an uncanny resemblance to the former leader of Poland's Solidarity trade union, Lech Walesa.
No, it's not some form of divine intervention. The Polish art conservator, Andrzej Rejniak, who worked on repairing the piece in 1981 while Poland was under martial law, used the mustachioed former freedom fighter as his model.
"It was done on the very clear request of the local Slovakian oppositionists," Rejniak said. "They were art historians and they were looking after those pieces."
Rejniak was working for Poland's state-owned Monument Conservation Labs at the time, and while he says if he had been caught, his political indiscretion would not have seen him sent to a Siberian gulag, it could have cost him his job.
But times have changed and today Rejniak is one of the founding employees at Poland's first and largest, privately owned building, sculpture and artifact conservation and restoration firms Monument.
Created in 1990 when Poland's political system was undergoing massive changes after the retreat of socialism, Rejniak and 15 colleagues, dreaming of independence and money, left the government's conservation labs en masse to form Monument.
The president of the company, who was voted into the position by his colleagues, is 50-year-old Stanislaw Plebanski.
"Before, when I worked for the state-owned company, I just performed my work," he said. "Now, I decide about everything. It's me who negotiates with the customer. I set the terms and the price."
In those early days, there was little competition, but over time, Plebanski said Monument and a handful of private operators have seen the demise of the state-owned operation, which now outsources most of its restoration projects.
The close-knit Monument team, which has worked together for more than 20 years, operates out of a couple of rather shabby sheds in the swampy flatlands behind Lazienki Park.
In the "lab" a huge tin shed where everything is covered in a light sprinkling of marble dust a 10-foot sculpture of Jesus on a crucifix dominates the room. Its bronze twin hangs outside Warsaw's St. Augustine Church.
Monument has worked on some of Warsaw's most famous landmarks. Its first assignment was the Presidential Palace on ulica Krakowskie Przedmiescie. The project took six years and was completed in 1998.
"We also conducted conservation in the interior, including the first floor where the president's study is, and the 'column room' where the round table talks (in 1989 between the communists and the Polish oppositionists) were held," said Plebanski, who at one stage, had 128 specialist tradesmen working on the site.
So just how much did it cost? "It was very expensive, but I don't remember now the work went on for so long, calculating a total figure is difficult," Plebanski said, discreetly avoiding putting a figure on just how much was spent on sprucing up the home of Poland's democratically-elected leader.
The company's other big projects are the Wilanow Palace and Monument's own backyard, Lazienki Park, where Plebanski and co. have restored many sculptures to their former glory. One sculpture can take three months to restore, at a cost of zl. 20,000-zl. 30,000.
But like most Polish businesses, the state of the economy has seen a slowing of work at Monument.
"From a historical perspective, monument preservation has always been the duty of the state," said Monument sculptor Witold Czopowik. "A poor country begins to neglect that duty."
"With one exception," added colleague Jacek Jablonski, "totalitarian countries never neglect it."
According to Plebanski, one area of growth, albeit slow growth, is small, private clients. He has restored everything from individual pieces of furniture, to entire country manors.
"I think there are more and more people who have money and who want to decorate their houses or gardens, particularly for people who buy old palaces and manors," he said.
They also recently made some gigantic plaster sculptures for the film set of the Polish production of Sienkiewicz's novel, Quo Vadis.
However, Monument's greatest source of work continues to come from the Catholic Church. Because of the total destruction of Warsaw during World War II, there is less general conservation work there than in other European cities. After the war, teams of artisans were needed to work on the reconstruction of Warsaw's Old Town to its former 17th and 18th century appearance. The resulting job earned it a World Heritage listing from UNESCO, but since then big projects have been few.
One thing Monument hasn't yet been recruited to do is work on some of Poland's more recent socialist buildings and sculptures.
"But we wouldn't be surprised if it comes because that's an element of the job," Czopowik said.
"We would approach such a piece without any aesthetical prejudices," he added with a devilish grin.
