Piotr Skrzynecki

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Piotr Skrzynecki by Grażyna Borkowska-Niemojewska and Łukasz Niemojewski, 2000
Vis a Vis Cafe, Rynek Glowny
Stare Miasto (Old Town)
Kraków, September 2018

“Piotr Cezary Skrzynecki (1930–1997) was a Polish choreographer and director, cabaret impresario, best known for his involvement with the cabaret Piwnica pod Baranami (Cellar under the Rams), of whose he was the founder. Skrzynecki was born 12 September 1930 in Warsaw. He was the son of a Pole Marian Skrzynecki, lieutenant colonel in the Polish Army and a Jewess Magdalena Endelman. His father died during the Soviet invasion of Poland, when he was the commander of the 7-th Lubelski Cavalry Regiment. After World War II his family moved to Łódź. There he attended a theater school associated with the National Film School in Łódź. Next he moved to Kraków where he begun studies in history of art at the Jagiellonian University. There, at the age of 26, in 1956 he organized student club which, in time, became Piwnica pod Baranami, with its first performance in December that year. Until his death, he would be the leading member of Piwnica. It became the most popular intellectual cabaret in postwar Poland, and one of the symbols of Kraków. Although it was not primarily a political humor group, coming in the wake of the liberalization of Polish October, the Piwnica cabaret became famous for its satirical criticism of the People's Republic of Poland communist regime. Polish magazine Przekrój wrote that ‘For 41 years [Skrzynecki] and his cabaret persuaded us that, despite the system, we had come into this world for happiness and joy.’.” (Piotr Skrzynecki, Wikipedia)