Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Kraków

In Strzelecki Park, you have reached Kraków’s memorial to Ignacy Jan Paderewski, unveiled on the seventeenth of July 2010. On its pedestal, the inscription names him an artist and statesman; the musical staff beneath begins “Hej, Orle Biały.” This was Paderewski’s last poem and his last composition, written in 1917.

At the base, notice the small plaque carrying the Silver Rooster emblem of the Kraków Marksmen’s Brotherhood. Paderewski was an honorary member, and the Brotherhood funded the monument. The commission marked several anniversaries at once: 150 years since Paderewski’s birth, six centuries since the Battle of Grunwald, 100 years since the Grunwald Monument was unveiled, and 600 years of Kraków’s merchants’ congregation.

Czesław Dźwigaj created it. Paderewski’s career gives the inscription its force. He won international fame as a virtuoso pianist, composer, philanthropist, and public figure.

In 1919 he helped secure international recognition for the new Polish Republic, served as prime minister and foreign minister, and signed the Treaty of Versailles for Poland. His opera Manru remains the only work by a Polish composer performed at the Metropolitan Opera. This is one of three monuments to him in Kraków.