Krakowskie pomniki epoki komunizmu i ich losy

This work concerns the memorials from the PRL period which were located in Kraków. The monuments described in this work are connected with figures and events related to communism – they were build between 1945-1989 when Poland was under the communist regime. A few years after The World War II the first socialistic city in Poland, Nowa Huta, started to develop. Some of the memorials were built here e.g. the most renowned of Kraków’s PRL-related monuments, Włodzimierz Lenin memorial located on plac Centralny. Beside this specific memorial there were some more monuments commemorating the events of communism (e.g. a couple of monuments in memory of soviet soldiers or the memorial of Iwan Koniew who was especially glorified in Kraków). These and other monuments have been described in this work along with specific details concerning their time of built, their designers, the way they look (or looked). Pictures of these memorials are an integral part of this work. It is worth mentioning that after 1989, the year which brought the change of the country’s political system, most of such monuments were removed due to anti-communist spirit. Nowadays many people do not even know where they were situated. This is why this work also presents the locations of these currently non-existent memorials. The work concludes with describing the social reception of these socialistic monuments which was mostly negative. Many citizens perceived them as symbols of the communist regime – a political system which they strongly despised. The information incorporated into this work have been based mainly on local press releases of that time and various publications presenting Kraków’s history during the PRL period.Niniejsza praca dotyczy pomników związanych z komunizmem, które powstały w Krakowie w latach 1945-1989. Przedstawione zostało w niej szesnaście tego rodzaju monumentów. Celem pracy było opisanie tych pomników, a w szczególności okoliczności ich powstania oraz ich późniejszych losów. Opisy tych pomników poprzedzone zostały rysem historycznym Krakowa, który przedstawia w najogólniejszym zakresie dzieje miasta w latach 1945-1989