Cribs and Christmas exhibitions – where and when

According to the tradition of the Catholic Church, the first crib was built by Saint Francis of Assisi. He placed a figure of small Christ inside the crib, with live animals - an ox and a donkey – standing beside it. That was at the beginning of the 13th century in the small Italian village of Greccio. From that time on, cribs began to be placed regularly in churches and in front of them.

Cribs and gingerbread

In the Ethnographic Museum, we can watch Bethlehem cribs built by schoolchildren from Lower Silesian schools till 31st January. Cribs are made of pottery, glass, paper (including tissue paper), felt, but also of macaroni, pasta, gingerbread and many other materials. It is already the 23th Post-Competition Exhibition ‘The Most Beautiful Bethlehem Crib’, which is organised by the Youth Cultural Centre ‘Śródmieście’, the Gallery of Works by Young Visual Artists and the Ethnographic Museum in Wroclaw.

In the same museum, another exhibition is open: ‘Gingerbread. A Journey to the Land of Senses through Silesia, Upper Lusatia and 900 Years of Culinary Culture in Central Europe’. The exhibition presents the history of the gingerbread industry – primarily in Silesia and Lusatia, as well as the ingredients and process of production of this aromatic cake.

The collection of the Ethnographic Museum contains around 250 such forms, part of which will be made available at the exhibition. For example, we will see ‘Heart’, which was usually dedicated to a beloved person, ‘Alphabet’, which was granted to a child when it went to school for the first time, or ‘An Infant in Swaddling’, which was granted to young parents. Other motifs, such as ‘A Lady’ or ‘An Angel with a Palm’, are examples of very decorative and intricately carved forms. Gingerbread in the form of pipes was granted to elderly persons, gingerbread gloves were given to friends, and gingerbread baskets of flowers were gifts for beloved persons. At the exhibition, we can also admire gingerbread forms presenting genre scenes and various animals (from farm to exotic animals). There are forms with religious motifs – the adoration of the Magi, the scene of the Flight into Egypt, images of saints and angels. We will also see boxes and signboards of bakers’ guilds and even a layout of a 19th-century kitchen with a characteristic sideboard and a Christmas tree decorated with Christmas gingerbread cakes.

The Ethnographic Museum will be open on 27th December from 10:00 a.m. till 4:00 p.m.

Cribs from around the world

Made of wood, glass, stone, paper, grass, on leaf, on board, in Krakow. Over 130 Christmas cribs from around the world can be seen in the Wroclaw City Museum. ‘Shepherds Came to Bethlehem. Christmas Cribs from around the World’ is an exhibition that not only serves as an introduction to Christmas, but also shows the rich content of the approaching Christmas celebration. ‘We have been preparing this exhibition for three years – everybody wants to present these mysteries in Christmas time,’ stresses Maciej Łagiewski, the director of the Wroclaw City Museum.

Cribs from around the world have only one common feature: the presence of the Holy Family. The rest reflects the period and place in which the crib was built. ‘The exhibition presents cribs from around the world; apart from our native cribs, we can also watch cribs made in missionary countries,’ says Magdalena Szmida-Półbratek, the curator of the exhibition. ‘Many cribs that are exotic to us come from the collections of Polish missionaries, who bring them from their posts,’ she adds. Thus, apart from the classic crib, we can also admire a yurt, the dark-skinned Mary, the slanty-eyed Joseph or Jesus with a small tiger lying beside him.

The exhibition can be seen in the Historical Museum – a branch of the Wroclaw City Museum. The Museum will be open on 27th December from 10:00 a.m. till 6:00 p.m.

During Christmas, each parish can boast its own crib. The most famous crib, which is shown not only during Christmas, but also for the rest of the year, is the moving crib in the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Piasek.

It was built by the late Rev. Kazimierz Błaszczyk, the priest of deaf-and-dumb and blind persons. His first mobile crib, built in 1967, was addressed to deaf and visually impaired children. Every year he expanded it with new figures, toys and dolls. Apart from classic figures of shepherds or animals, we can see lots of toys here. When the light goes out and the crib lamps begin to flash, figures in folk costumes, carousels and windmills are set in motion, a train set runs around them, windmills roll, and Mickey Mouse beats out a rhythm on plates. There is even Donald Duck and other characters from cartoons.

The cribs is available to visitors between masses; during Christmas, it attracts so many visitors that you may have to wait in a queue in front of the chapel where it is located.