“FIRA” AT THE 25th JEWISH CULTURE FESTIVAL IN KRAKOW

June 24, 2015

We cordially invite you to the meeting dedicated to a book titled “Fira”, which will take place on Monday, June 29,2015, starting at 6 p.m. at the Jewish Culture Centre in Krakow- at Meiselsa 17. The event will be conducted by Andrzej Niziolek and Ksenia Kosakowska, the book’s authors, assisted by Janusz Makuch, the festival supervisor.

In the festival programme, we read: „Fira Melamedzon-Salanska was beautiful, wise and rich by her Jewish-Polish heart, which stopped at the threshold of her 100^th birthday. She came from Poznan. She was a Polish Jewess, from whom Poland could learn patriotism. She was a zealous Zionist, who each day trembled for the fate of Eretz Israel. She lived and died in Jerusalem. “Safta Fira”- Grandma Fira. Two authors, Ksenia Kosakowska, her “Polish granddaughter” and Andrzej Niziolek, wrote a moving, wise and beautiful book about Fira, the era before the Holocaust, about “ a Jewish quarter in Poznan”, about memory. Ksenia and Andrzej, presenting unique photographs, will tell about long and extraordinary life of Fira Melamedzon-Salanska. She deserved our highest tribute. And love.”

„FIRA” WAS ANNOUNCED THE BEST BOOK ABOUT POZNAN IN  2014

March 21, 2015

Our album-book „Fira. The Jews of Poznan. A Story About Life” won the Jozef Lukaszewicz Posnania Prize (Lukaszewicz was the first legendary librarian of Raczynscy Library), which made it one of three  titles announced The Best Books About Poznan published in 2014.

The other two winners of this prize are: „Kowalski’s Furniture. People and Things” by Jacek Kowalski and “Modernism Familiarized. Poznan Architecture 1919-1939” by Szymon Piotr Kubiak. On 19th of March, 2015, both the authors and the publisher of “Fira”, Tomasz Adamski’s Exemplum Publisher, were awarded. More than 100 books and publications about Poznan, published in 2014, took part in this year’s competition, organized by the Raczynscy Library for the 16th time. You can find more information and photos of the prize-giving ceremony at:

http://www.bracz.edu.pl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1628&Itemid=100

June 13, 2014

On Friday, 13^th ofJune 2014, Andrzej Niziolek met with readers of the book-album „Fira. The Jews of Poznan. A Story about Life” in a Poznan bookstore „Z Bajki”. He told about Fira Melamedzon-Salanska and her memories about Poznan Jews of the interwar period. He also presented some photographs from Fira’s albums. The meeting was attended by several dozen people. Even though it lasted more than two hours, till the evening, nobody left before it had ended.

On Monday, 23^rd of June, the next meeting presented our book, Fira Melamedzon-Salanska, her photographs and memories will take place. It will start at 6 p.m., in the room 1 of the old building of the Raczynskich Library at Freedom Square 19. The book will be available to buy there.

June 09, 2014

If you are interested in the interview with Andrzej Niziolek  about the book „Fira. The Jews of Poznan. A Story about Life” conducted by Remigiusz Kozinski from Poznan television WTK, go to http://wtkplay.pl/video-id-11559-projekt_fira_1915. We repeat here the call to the readers, Poznan people and internet users in Poland and abroad for contacting us if you recognize anyone, or you know anything about his/her fates, or you have any photographs of Fira and the people mentioned in her memories or seen in the pictures.

May 31, 2014

The representative room 5 of the old building of the Raczynskich Library didn’t hold all the people who came at noon to the first presentation of the book-album „Fira. The Jews of Poznan. A Story about Life”. Andrzej Niziolek and Ksenia Kosakowska, the authors, talked about creating and the content of the book and website as well as about Fira, Ksenia’s Israeli grandmother, who had saved the photographs and memory of Polish Jews.

Fira Melamedzon-Salanska died in May 7, 2014 in Jerusalem. She wished to pass her albums with the photographs of Poznan Jews to the Raczynskich Library. Fira’s family, her daughter Lili Rubin, her daughter-in law Eti Salansky and her four grandsons, came from Israel to the ceremony and solemnly passed the five out of six albums to the Heritage Collections of the Raczynskich Library. Now, they will be drawn up and digitalised. In the future, they will be make available to the public for journalistic, educational and cultural purposes.

Unintentionally, the albums came back to Poland and Poznan exactly 75 years after their owner left for Palestine. Young Fira Melamedzon-Salanska crossed the border of Poland on her way to Palestine in May 31, 1939. The albums came back to Poznan in May 31, 2014.

Just after the celebration, an exhibition of enlarged reproductions of Fira’s photographs was opened in the Tea-house placed in a new wing of the Raczynskich Library. The curators of the exhibition are Sonia Rammer, a painter, psychologist and pedagogue at the University of Arts in Poznan and Andrzej Niziolek. The target of the exhibition was not to show again the pictures published in the book and on our website www.fira1915.pl but to let the Poznan people, drinking tea in the library public space, meet face to face with those who used to live in the same city and walk along the same streets.

The photographs we show come for the Raczynskich Library’s collections.

Photographic and media reports of the first presentation of the project ceremony can be found at:

http://poznan.naszemiasto.pl/galeria/zdjecia/fira-poznanscy-zydzi-premiera-ksiazki-zdjecia,2292872,galeria,t,id,tm.html (“Glos Wielkopolski” newspaper)

http://www.radiomerkury.pl/informacje/pozostale/niezwykle-zdjecia-firy.html  (Merkury Radio)

http://www.gloswielkopolski.pl/artykul/3457047,fira-poznanscy-zydzi-opowiesc-o-zyciu-premiera-ksiazki-w-bibliotece-raczynskich-zdjecia,id,t.html (“Glos Wielkopolski” newspaper)

http://poznan.gazeta.pl/poznan/1,36037,16073910,Wraz_z_tymi_zdjeciami_wracaja_do_nas_poznanscy_Zydzi.html#LokPozTxt (“Gazeta Wyborcza Poznan” newspaper)

http://www.bracz.edu.pl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1371&Itemid=100 (the Raczynskich Library)

Fira Melamedzon, the main character and narrator of our book, died on Wednesday evening in Jerusalem. She turned 99 on April 19. We wanted her to  get a ready book , for which she was waiting. We didn’t succeed, though we were very close. However, we succeeded in something else, which is very important to us. We have saved the memory of the Poznan Jews presented in her  photographs.  “As long as I Iive, they live in me,” Fira used to say. Owing to the book that comes out on May 31, they will live even longer. And she will live with them.

Good bye, Fira. Thank you.

Ksenia Kosakowska, Andrzej Niziolek

On Sunday, May 11, we invite you to presentations of the interwar Poznan Jews’ photographs  from the albums of Fira Melamedzon-Salanska, the Poznan woman, who has been lived in Jerusalem since 1939. The book- album “Fira. The Jews of Poznan. A Story about Life”, which is ready for printing now, is based on these photos. The presentations will be a part of the Poznan Jewish Street Festival, organized in our city for the second time. Festival events will take place on Saturday  and Sunday, May 10 and 11, in the Adam Mickiewicz University Botanical Garden and in the Jewish Street.

There will be two presentations of the photographs on Sunday, May 11. First one will start at 11.30 a.m. in the Exhibition and Education Hall of the Adam Mickiewicz University Botanical Garden at Dabrowskiego Street 165. Second one will start at 5 p.m. in the Van Gogh club at the Jewish Street 12. Andrzej Niziolek, the book’s co-author, will present the photos and Fira’s memories of the Poznan Jews before 1939.

The book-album will come out on the 31^st of May. On May 11, we would like to present you the whole “Fira” project including its publishing, exhibition and online components. Also, we will be presenting some fragments of the book. During the festival, the Poznan Jews’ photographs  from Fira’s albums will be hung in the windows of cafes and restaurants of the Jewish Street.

The detailed programme of the Poznan Jewish Street Festival can be found at www.poznan.jewish.org.pl

We will be placing here information about the project and giving you accounts of events relating to it . So far, we have got one message: we are starting!