The neon sign “Siatkarka” has been entered in the register of movable monuments. The luminous installation adorns the facade of the building at 5 Konstytucji Square. The entry was announced by the Mazovian Voivodeship Conservator of Monuments.
The distinctive neon sign has become a permanent part of the landscape of Constitution Square in Warsaw. The installation has adorned the façade of the building since 1961. Its design was created by graphic artist and architect Jan Mucharski, who belonged to the team of the Pracownia Projektów Neonów (Neon Design Workshop) of the Warsaw “Reklama” enterprise.
In its announcement about the entry in the register, the conservator notes that the neon sign is “an example of a realisation of individual artistic expression and high artistic class”. The neon sign is distinguished by its partly animated composition. Indeed, the eponymous volleyball player appears to be throwing a ball, which appears in a short sequence.
The neon sign was originally part of an advertisement for a sporting goods shop that operated in the ground floor of the building.
The elements of the original outdoor advertising constituted a coherent typographic and iconographic composition, which was complemented by the inscriptions ‘MHD’ and ‘SPORT’, which have not been preserved to the present day, mounted between the pillars in the arcades, and a horizontal line glowing green, stretching along the façade and the eastern elevation of the building – informs the Mazovian Regional Conservator of Monuments.
The neon sign was created during the period of intense neonisation of Warsaw. Decades ago, similar illuminated installations were a form of advertising, which today is remembered with longing. This is because neon signs exhibited a decidedly higher artistic level in comparison to the temporary colourful signs and advertisements that we encounter in public space today.
From the 1950s to the end of the 1980s, the installation of neon signs was part of an urban planning scheme that placed colourful advertisements along the main streets in the centre. Most of the neon signs installed in Warsaw were made by Przedsiębiorstwo Usług Reklamowych ,,Reklama”, which was renamed Stołeczne Przedsiębiorstwo Instalacji Reklam Świetlnych in 1972.
The object’s historical value lies in the fact that it is a material testimony to the top-down, planned neonisation process carried out during the communist era in Polish cities, including Warsaw. The preserved neon sign is a relic of the urban structure of pl. Konstytucji, which was an element of the MDM housing estate and a representative area of the city. The artistic values of the installation in question result from its balanced composition, synthetically presented form, and the effect of lightness of the composition, despite its monumental character (thanks to the contour treatment of individual elements and giving the impression of movement to the whole, obtained through diagonal and expressive posing of figures, as well as the use of light animation),” concludes the Mazovian Voivodeship Conservator of Monuments.
The neon sign ‘Volleyball Player’ was renovated in 2018 with financial support from the Foksal Gallery Foundation.
photos: K. Lipke-Żurek, P. Żurek
source: Mazovian Voivodeship Historic Preservation Officer
Read also: Warsaw | Neon signs | Monument | City | Featured | whiteMAD on Instagram
