Left behind. Janina Katz and the Polish Jews in Denmark
New special exhibition from October 9, 2025 to April 5, 2026 at the Danish Jewish Museum
The special exhibition tells the story of the arrival of Polish Jews to Denmark 1969-1975 through the prism of the Polish-Danish Jewish writer Janinas Katz.
Janina Katz was born in 1939. She survived the Holocaust and grew up in post-war Poland under communist rule. She came to Denmark as a refugee from Poland in 1970. She was just one of almost 3.000 Polish Jews who came to Denmark between 1969 and 1975. They were forced to leave Poland after the communist regime launched an anti-Zionist and anti-Semitic campaign against Jews, forcing them to leave the country.
In 1991, Janina made her debut as a writer in Danish. Her many novels, short stories and poems describe life in the shadow of double persecution – the anti-Semitism of Nazism and Communism – about life as a refugee, about fitting in, about identities, belonging, inherited traumas and many other topics that are central to the great story and common to the lives and destinies of many of the other Polish refugees, but also hope, passion and love – about being human. She received a number of awards for her writing before her death in 2013.
Janina Katz's story is important, exciting and interesting in its own right. It is also an expression of a more general story about anti-Semitism in Europe and the Cold War, with significance for both Danish history and Danish Jewish history.
The Polish Jews added new life, a new culture, but also a different memory and history to Danish Jewish history.
Who is Janina Katz?
Janina Katz (1939-2013) was a Holocaust survivor and refugee from communist Poland in 1969. She made her debut as a writer in Danish in 1991 and has since expressed herself with power and irony about identity and exile. She was awarded the Danish Arts Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002 and was nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize for her poetry collection Written in Polish in 2012.
Activities during the exhibition period
Stay tuned in the fall and spring! We will be giving lectures, events, making a podcast and much more about the Polish Jews in Denmark. So keep an eye on the event calendar and our news on the website and social media.
Book publishing
Based on the writings of Janina Katz, this anthology describes the story of the arrival of Polish Jews in Denmark.
Janina Katz's story and writings are also a testament to the fact that with the Polish Jews, a different memory of the Holocaust came to Denmark, which was not based on the story of 'October 1943', the flight and rescue of the vast majority of Danish Jews to Sweden. On the contrary, it is based on the catastrophic and devastating story of the mass murder of European Jews during the Holocaust, which is thus also part of Danish Jewish history today.
Janina Katz's story is important, exciting and interesting in its own right. It is also an expression of a more general story about anti-Semitism in Europe and the Cold War, with significance for both Danish history and Danish Jewish history.
The anthology contains contributions by: Martin Hall, Søren E. Jensen, Jessica Ortner, Beata Ruben, Henia Vrazda, Signe Bergman Larsen, Sara Fredfeldt Stadager and Janus Møller Jensen.
The book is published in both Danish and English, and can be purchased in the museum shop.
To the press
Here you can read the press release and download press photos to promote the project, the exhibition and the anthology.
Mention
“Poetic beauty with the ironic undercurrent of tragedy is characteristic of Katz" - from mention in The waterfront on 28 September 2025. You can read the article here.
Event calendar for the special exhibition
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