Whose Land? - Alaska and Siberia at the State Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw

“Czyja to ziemia?” (Whose Land?) is a new temporary exhibition at the State Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw about the mechanisms of settler colonialism, taking as its example Alaska and Siberia in the early 20th century, the time of the gold rush. Its starting point is photographs and walrus-tusk carvings from the museum’s collections. The exhibition will be on at the museum’s main building 21 November 2026 - 30 May 2027; the opening is planned for 21 November 2026.

The State Ethnographic Museum on the exhibition (our translation):

Can land be anyone’s property? The exhibition “Whose Land?” shows the mechanisms of settler colonialism through the example of Alaska and Siberia in the early 20th century - a period of gold rush and intense colonial expansion.

The land is not empty

The starting point of the exhibition is photographs and walrus-tusk carvings from the collections of the State Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw. The collection makes it possible to trace how photography and collecting practices helped to shape ideas about the world. The photographs on show often present Alaska and Siberia as “empty land”. These territories were treated as a resource that could be appropriated, named and developed anew, according to one’s own needs. Yet for generations they had been inhabited by people whose lives and environment were suddenly subordinated to imperial interests.

A rifle in one hand, a camera in the other

The exhibition includes photographs of Indigenous communities, mainly the Inuit and the Chukchi. Photographs of empty landscapes and of the people who live in these regions are not opposites, although it might seem so. They are elements of colonial mechanisms of representing the world, which join people and land into a single, inseparable image. In this way the exhibition is a reminder that photography has never been neutral.

From colonialism to the present

“Whose Land?” is the title question, pointing both to the historical effects of colonialism and to the continuity of the mechanisms that govern the world. Land and its resources remain the object of constant appropriation - from the gold rush to present-day extractivism. This exploitation often takes place at the expense of local communities, non-human animals and the natural environment.

What to expect

According to the museum, the archive photographs and walrus-tusk carvings from its collections are linked with the period of the “gold rush” and the intense colonisation of Alaska and Siberia. The exhibition will include photographs of Indigenous communities, mainly the Inuit and the Chukchi, and beside them photographs of empty landscapes.

The museum announces a story of how photography and collecting practices helped to shape ideas about the world. The photographs often present Alaska and Siberia as “empty land” that could be appropriated, named and developed anew, although people had lived there for generations. According to the museum, landscapes without people and portraits of the inhabitants are not opposites but parts of a single colonial way of representing the world; hence the exhibition’s point that photography has never been neutral.

In the description of its audio-described tour, the museum announces that an important point of reference in the exhibition will be a contemporary work, “Who we are”, by Nicholas Galanin. Galanin, born in 1979, is a multi-disciplinary artist and musician of the Sitka Tribe of Alaska, of Tlingit and Unangax̂ descent.

According to the museum, the title question concerns both the historical effects of colonialism and the continuity of the mechanisms by which land and its resources are still appropriated, from the gold rush to present-day extractivism. The exhibition belongs to the museum’s exhibition programme, which also includes the temporary exhibitions “Wszystko się zmieni” (Everything Will Change) and “Zasoby” (Resources); each of them takes up the subject of extractivism, as a model of unlimited exploitation of resources, in its own way. The museum opens “Zasoby” on the same weekend.

Context

Settler colonialism is, according to the English Wikipedia, a process in which settlers exercise colonial rule over a land and its indigenous peoples: they transform the land, and eliminate and replace its population with the society of the settlers.

The Inuit, as the Polish Wikipedia puts it, are a group of indigenous peoples of the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Canada and Alaska, and the Chukchi are a Paleo-Asiatic people indigenous to Siberia, living in north-eastern Russia. Walrus-ivory carving and engraving, according to the English Wikipedia, has been an important folk art of the peoples of the Arctic since prehistoric times, among them the Inuit and the Chukchi. In Alaska, the Nome Gold Rush lasted, according to the same source, approximately from 1899 to 1909.

The curator of the exhibition and author of its texts is Julia Grudzień, a doctoral student researching photography and museums, particularly in a decolonial context, who works in the museum’s education department; the project is coordinated by Justyna Dominiak. The exhibition was designed by Anna Sarnowska and Natalia Wojciechowska, the visual identity and typesetting of the texts are by Karolina Pietrzyk and Tobias Wenig, and the archive material was catalogued and digitised by Joanna Bartuszek and Alicja Kobus. The media patrons of the exhibition are Polish Radio’s Programme Two (Program Drugi Polskiego Radia), TVP Kultura, the weekly “Polityka”, and the magazines “Pismo” and “Szum”.

Tickets and time

• Where: at the main building of the State Ethnographic Museum, as a new temporary exhibition in the museum. Directions and practical information about the museum are on the museum profile.
• When: 21 November 2026 - 30 May 2027; the museum lists the exhibition among its upcoming shows and announces its opening for 21 November 2026.
• Ticket: the museum names two kinds of admission ticket: to all exhibitions, or to the temporary exhibitions only. For the guided tours on the opening weekend an admission ticket to the museum is enough, with no extra charge; for later tours you need a tour-and-visit ticket, which costs the same as a ticket for the visit alone. The dates are in the list of events.
• Language: the exhibition will have texts in Polish and in English; the English page of the exhibition on the museum’s website is titled “Whose Land?”.
• Accessibility: the museum announces audio description of the whole exhibition, tactile graphics of selected objects, a video guide and information in Polish Sign Language (PJM), plain-language information and places to rest. For people sensitive to stimuli it has prepared quiet hours at the temporary exhibitions, with dimmed light and fewer sounds.
• Who it’s for: people interested in the history of colonialism, in the Arctic and in photography as a source that has to be read with care: the exhibition shows that photographs of “empty land” and portraits of the inhabitants served the same colonial picture of the world. The museum aims its guided tour on 22 November at teenagers and adults, and thanks to the audio description of the whole exhibition, the tactile graphics and the video guide in PJM, blind, partially sighted and Deaf visitors can use the exhibition too.
• Who can skip it: anyone expecting a tale of the exotic Arctic and old photographs to admire: the museum announces a critical look at how photography and collecting served the appropriation of land.

Events

• 21 November 2026, 15:00-16:00 - a guided tour of the exhibition on the opening weekend; no extra charge, an admission ticket to the museum (to all exhibitions or to the temporary exhibitions only) is enough - event page
• 22 November 2026, 12:00-13:00 - a guided tour for teenagers and adults on the opening weekend; no charge beyond the admission ticket to the museum, places limited, the museum asks visitors to arrive early - event page
• 24 November 2026, 17:00-18:00 - an audio-described tour, with tactile graphics prepared for two works; a tour-and-visit ticket at the price of a ticket for the visit alone - event page
• 24 November 2026, 18:00-19:30 - the debate “Kto kradnie przestrzeń?” (Who steals space?), accompanying the opening of the exhibition; among the guests is the curator, Julia Grudzień; free tickets to be collected, places limited - event page
• 25 November 2026, 18:00-20:00 - quiet hours at the temporary exhibitions “Zasoby” and “Czyja to ziemia?”: a visit with dimmed lighting and fewer sound stimuli, for teenagers and adults, aimed at people sensitive to stimuli, autistic people among them; included in the price of the temporary-exhibitions ticket, places limited - event page
• 29 November 2026, 14:00-15:00 - a guided tour; a tour-and-visit ticket (to all exhibitions or to the temporary exhibitions only) at the price of a ticket for the visit alone - event page
• 8 December 2026, 17:00-18:00 - a guided tour; a tour-and-visit ticket at the price of a ticket for the visit alone - event page

See also

• State Ethnographic Museum - the profile of the museum in whose main building the exhibition will be shown.
• Everything Will Change - the first part of the “Resources” programme: four installations by artist collectives in glass pavilions on the Vistula boulevard, shown until 27 October 2026.

Museum profile: State Ethnographic Museum.