Warsaw appoints new deputy mayor with strong Krakow culture background

Warsaw is appointing Magdalena Sroka as deputy mayor responsible for the capital’s cultural institutions and cultural affairs, filling the position left vacant after Aldona Machnowska-Góra’s departure.

Machnowska-Góra, a longtime deputy mayor valued by artists and Warsaw institutions, resigned in July after the controversy at South Hospital, where she served on the supervisory board. Sroka now takes over the portfolio with a career built largely in cultural administration in Krakow.

Sroka studied Polish philology and theater studies at Jagiellonian University. From 1998 to 2003, she worked with the Krakow 2000 Festival Office, managing cultural projects linked to Krakow’s European Capital of Culture title. She oversaw events including the Ludwig van Beethoven Easter Festival, the Opera Film Festival and the Crossroads Traditional Music Festival.

She later became director of the Krakow Festival Office and served as Krakow’s deputy mayor for culture and city promotion. Sroka also helped establish the Ludwig van Beethoven Association and chaired the council of the Academy of Theatre Arts.

Her connection with Warsaw grew in 2015, when she won a competition to lead the Polish Film Institute. Culture Minister Piotr Gliński dismissed her two years later after a letter from the institute to an American film producers’ association suggested that Poland’s right-wing government had introduced censorship. More than three years later, a labor court ruled that her removal lacked legal grounds and breached labor law.