About us

Our Mission

With our actions, we want to strengthen bonds of the citizens of Nowa Huta with the place they live in.

Activity

The C. K. Norwid Culture Centre in Kraków is a municipal cultural institution with over 60 year’s heritage. We conduct our activities in the district of Nowa Huta and undertake actions to its benefit. We focus primarily on educational, artistic, sociocultural and pro-ecological projects, addressed to local communities of Kraków, and Nowa Huta in particular.

The purpose of cultural institutions is constantly changing. It is no longer merely a place, where one seeks to commune with high culture. Nowadays, above all, it acts as a social animator, activating and motivating local communities to work together, towards finding solutions to the most significant social problems, as well as methods of satisfying needs.

In order to meet those challenges, C. K. Norwid Culture Centre actively participates in the processes of revitalization, helping to strengthen the social potential, as well as aiming to develop local communities on a partnership basis. Since the very beginning, we have been the vanguard in the discussion and processes regarding the Local Program of Revitalization of Kraków, especially in the area of the so called “old” Nowa Huta. We closely collaborate with institutions, organizations and other entities from the local communities. Being the producer of Nowa Huta Newsreel, we document the history of our district. Simultaneously, through TVP 3 (region-focused tv channel), we promote the most fascinating projects and initiatives regarding Nowa Huta in the whole Lesser Poland. We also undertake a variety of initiatives in the areas of activation and training programs, dedicated to persons 55+.

In the years 2004-2008, heading the Nowa Huta Initiatives Partnership, our Culture Centre was the applicant and the leader of the project “Nowa Huta – New Opportunity”, conducted in partnership, within the frames of the Community Initiative Programme EQUAL. The most significant achievement of this project was creation of one of the favourite trip destinations of the citizens of the whole Lesser Poland – the Stanisław Lem Garden of Experiences. The Garden was established through the efforts of our Centre, within the frameworks of the project “Nowa Huta – New Opportunity”, and subsequently - following its commissioning – entrusted to the Museum of Municipal Engineering in Kraków for further managing. In the years 2011-2014, within the frameworks of the Central Europe Programme, CKN Culture Centre, jointly with partners from Poland, Czech Republic, Germany, Slovakia and Slovenia, implemented the international project “ReNewTown. New Post-Socialist City: Competitive and Attractive”. This led to the creation of a modern space dedicated to artistic and social initiatives, in one of buildings of our institution, called the ARTzona (ARTzone).

The C. K. Norwid Culture Centre implements series of socio-artistic projects, acquiring funds from the programmes of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, or from the Polish Film Institute. We also receive various forms of support from District Councils of Nowa Huta, as well as from the Municipality of Kraków. Our actions include providing both substantive, and technical, support to local non-governmental organizations and informal groups. The Culture Centre recently endevours to modernize its infrastructure, by conducting building renovations, as well as upgrading the equipment in its possession, in order to meet the highest standards of a modern cultural institution: conversion of ARTzona, digitalization and expansion of Kino Studyjne Sfinks (Sfinks Cinema), modernization of the main building.

In the year 2015, C. K. Norwid Culture Centre celebrated its 60th anniversary. We accompany Nowa Huta and its citizens nearly from its very beginning. With our actions we aspire to incessantly inspire and strengthen the bonds and potential of the citizens of Nowa Huta, as well as their sense of responsibility for the place they live in.

Within the structures of our Culture Centre falls Kino Studyjne Sfinks (Sfinks Cinema) - which produces Nowohucka Kronika Filmowa (Nowa Huta Newsreel), ARTzona, Klub Kuźnia (Kuźnia Club), Dział Animacji i Promocji Kultury (Department of Animation and Cultural Promotion), Pracownia Animacji Ekologicznej (Workshop of Ecological Animation), two libraries and three galleries.

Contact person:
Jarosław Klaś
tel. +48 12 644 27 65, ext. 18
j.klas[at]okn.edu.pl