WHAT IS CHATKA ŻAKA? Chatka Żaka is Student Culture! This is an iconic institution on the map of Lublin that has been supporting students in their creative endeavours for nearly 60 years, promoting and popularising their achievements.
Fancy having a blast with friends at a concert, relax playing board games, or organise your very own project? That’s a match! Something is happening almost every day at the Academic Centre for Culture and Media!
Our activity is divided into 6 programme Lines. Have fun and experiment with MOVEMENT, SOUND, FRAME, WORD, LIFESTYLE, and VISUAL ART. Take part in recurring, mostly free workshops, film screenings, your friends’ exhibitions, performances by student groups, circus shows, or concerts by the biggest stars. Make your way to the Siema Żaki concert on October 3rd and stick around for Wolna Chatka (October 4-5th!). We’ll show you how to make the most of your uni years at Chatka Żaka.
Moreover, visit our flagship festivals, such as the Przez Świat. Spotkania z podróżą - travel festival (April), Studencka Wiosna Teatralna - theatre festival (May), Retrospekcje - retro festival (November), Bakcynalia - tourist and student song festival (November), or Mikołajki Folkowe - folk music festival (December), and drop in for the presentations of scholarship projects!
Got an idea for an activity? Carry out your project as part of the Student Culture Space. We also have the Academic Radio Centrum and TV UMCS, where you’ll have the opportunity to enhance your journalistic skills, host your own show, or produce your first report. Intrigued? Check out what’s on the next pages and design yourself at Chatka Żaka!
"They say that university is the best time of your life. After all, you have freedom, independence... to be able to decide on your own future. But what if the future is all about navigating a dark path without signposts yet full of hidden traps of social expectations? Where can you find the key to your needs and possibilities in this intricate world of others, in which we live?
Dear students, I will not give you a readymade recipe. Even though I completed my studies more than a dozen years ago, I still find it challenging to untangle the knots of our complex reality. However, I can and I want to suggest you a path that I chose many years ago, and it’s called CULTURE.
What can immersing yourself in the world of STUDENT CULTURE during your university years give you?
Let’s start with a sense of agency. In recent times, this popular term is a reflection of actions within the scope of a broad definition of art and culture in the context of other people as well as ourselves. Individuality and collectivity intertwine here organically. There are no cultural activities that do not impact others. Thus, we are sometimes recipients and sometimes creators of thoughts, messages, needs, or expectations. We help fellow participants understand the complexity of the world around us while simultaneously unrav-eling its mysteries ourselves.
In THEATRE, FILM, DANCE, or MUSIC, we learn to be together, or just alongside each other, but in tolerance towards our different needs and choices. In VISUAL ARTS, we discover new areas of interest while experiencing our reactions to surprising and extreme situations. Through interaction with culture and art, we shape our humanity in the society that surrounds us. That is quite a lot, isn’t it? Dear students, I cordially invite you to our Chatka Żaka, which will soon celebrate its 60th foundation anniversary at Maria Curie-Skłodowska University. I believe that our Patron would be more than pleased with the thousands of students who, for decades, have shaped themselves through STUDENT CULTURE. This academic year, we are waiting for you!
And remember, as Goethe used to say, “everything is hard before it is easy."
Izabela Pastuszko, Director of the UMCS Academic Centre for Culture and Media Chatka Żaka
