Mazel tov to architectural historian Dr. Eleonora Bergman who has received the 2025 Jan Zachwatowicz award, one of the most important honors in the field of cultural heritage protection in Poland.
The award is given for outstanding achievements in the field of research and protection of monuments and cultural heritage. The award was presented to Lena and fellow recipient Dr. Ulrich Schaaf, a researcher on wooden architecture, by Bożena Żelazowska, Secretary of State in the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, general conservator of monuments.
The ceremony took place this week at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, during a conference of ICOMOS, the International Council on Monuments and Sites.
Lena Bergman is one of the foremost experts on Jewish built heritage and cultural monuments in Poland. The author or co-author of numerous historical and urban studies, she has been dealing with monuments of Jewish culture, their history and documentation since the 1980s. She has worked at the Jewish Historical Institute since 1991 and was was its director from 2007 to 2011. Among her achievements, she was the co-author of the project commemorating the borders of the Warsaw ghetto, as well as co-author and publisher of 18 volumes of the so-called Ringelblum’s archive.
The Zachwatowicz Award was established in 2000 by the Polish National Committee of the International Council for the Protection of Monuments ICOMOS, the General Conservator of Monuments of the Republic of Poland, and Katarzyna Zachwatowicz-Jasieńska, Krystyna Zachwatowicz-Wajda and Andrzej Wajda on the centenary of the birth of prof. Jan Zachwatowicz.
Zachwatowicz (1900-1983) was a distinguished Polish art historian and conservator, who was instrumental in the reconstruction of Warsaw’s Old Town after its destruction in World War II.
Read the full announcement of the award