The “polenmARkT” Festival in Greifswald
n 2011, the jury of the “Pomerania Nostra” prize honoured the work of the “polenmARkT” association and the regular festival it conceived. This award is given to people who performed special services in the arts, science, politics, the economy, and social interaction. The prize was donated by the towns of Greifswald and Szczecin, the Greifswald and Szczecin universities and the editorial offices of the “Kurier Szczeciński” daily newspaper and the West Pomeranian “Nordkurier”. The prize giving ceremony for the representatives of the “polenmARkT” association was held in the castle of the Pomeranian Dukes (Zamek Książąt Pomorskich) in Szczecin, after it had already been awarded the prize for services to German-Polish cooperation by the Sparkasse Vorpommern. In 2017, on the occasion of the festival's 20th anniversary, the “polenmARkT e.V.” was awarded the German culture award of the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Here too, the long-standing contribution that the “polenmARkT” festival had made to consolidating German-Polish relations was instrumental in gaining the jury’s vote. The festival, which is not held in large cities where making contact with a neighbour’s culture is usually easier, has become a place in which the idea of German-Polish rapprochement can be experienced more easily than in any governmental talks.
Monika Stefanek, April 2020
polenmARkT e.V.
c/o Institut für Slawistik
Universität Greifswald
Ernst-Lohmeyer-Platz 3
17489 Greifswald
https://www.polenmarkt-festival.de/
https://www.facebook.com/polenmark
