Krzyzstof Czyzewski

Krzystof Czyzewski obtained a degree in Polish Literature at Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan. He was involved in the creation of the Gardzienice Theatre, where he worked from 1977 to 1983. During martial law in Poland, in 1983, together with Rafal Grupinshi he set up the newspaper Czas Kultury [Time of Culture], which was legalised in 1989 and is now one of the country's foremost cultural publications.

In the mid-1980s, he founded the Arka Theatre and started the "City of Encounters" project in Czarna Dabrowka, in which creators of alternative theatre and culture from all over Europe have taken part. He participated in the creation of the Borderland Foundation (1990), of which he is president. In 1991 he created the International Centre for Border Cultures, Arts and Peoples, which he also directs. Since 1993 he has been the editor of Krasnogruda literature and arts magazine.

He has been guest lecturer and speaker at various national and international universities and institutions, such as the Fine Arts Academy (Poznan), Warsaw University, New School University (New York) and the Transregional Centre for Democratic Studies (Krakow), etc. He also coordinates several projects about multicultural regions in Central and Eastern Europe, and is a member of institutions and foundations such as Unesco, the Art and Modernity Foundation and the Adam Mickiewicz Institute (both in Warsaw) and the International Institute for the Study of Culture and Education (Breslau).

He is a regular contributor to the French magazine Kultura. His latest published work is The Path of the Borderland. Both his literary output and his work on disseminating culture have been recognised on various occasions, the most recent being the St. George Medal (Krakow, 2000), the Order of Giediminas (Lithuania, 2001) and the Poland Restituta Cross (2002).