21.06.2010
Opening hours in Krakow’s Szkieletor (Skeletor)
The building of the Polish Federation of Engineering Associations, known to the residents of Krakow as the skeletor, was one of the most innovative construction enterprises in Communist Poland. The vision of a modern building, geared with conference rooms, audiovisual equipment, office-administrative rooms, restaurants and viewing terraces, never came true. The work of the constructors ended in raising an enormous cement and steel frame, which for over thirty years has towered over Mogilskie Roundabout like a ghost of the past endeavour. This dead construction, which has merged with the city landscape and lost contact with the old technological-architectonic initiative, was the basis for Paulina Pankiewicz’s project, Godziny Otwarcia [Opening hours], which took off on Saturday (19 June).
The artist decided to revive the building by putting it back in the context of the city from which it was torn through years of rusting and obscurity. Office workers have moved into the eighth floor of this enormous architectural frame. At 10 p.m. every day you can observe them working in the illuminated office, whose windows go out onto Berliny-Prażmowskiego Street.
We encourage everyone who has become accustomed to the passive presence of the building to confront the project. Paulina Pankiewicz’s initiative not only revives the dead steel construction which in turn makes contact with the building less automatic, but it also puts it back in its original context. Thanks to this, the building once again represents a technological initiative and a vision of an innovative business centre.




