THE ANDERS 2020 MEMORIAL PROJECT
The Anders-Italia 2020 Memorial project, promoted by the homonymous committee born within the association “Eredità e memoria”, foresees the participatory planning of a monument dedicated to the general Wladislav Anders, commander of the II Army Corps of the Polish Army that freed Imola on April 14, 1945. This shared planning involves, in addition to the association itself, the sculptor Luigi Enzo Mattei, the students of the 5th class of the technical institute “Luigi Paolini” (for the planimetric classification of the area and for the foundation of the statue in the form of school-work training) and those of the degree course in Ornamental Green and Protection of the Landscape at the University of Bologna.
The memorial will find its place in the green area named after General Anders alongside the
sanctuary of the Beata Vergine della Coraglia, along Via della Resistenza, next to the monument
of the Wojtek bear, the mascot of the II Army Corps of the Polish army. And will complete the picture
of the initiatives started since 2005, with the inauguration of the monument to the Polish soldier
originally placed at the entrance of Imola and transferred to the garden in 2018.
On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of General Wladyslaw Anders’ death and of the 75th of Liberation Day, our cultural Association «Eredità e Memoria» (Legacy and Memory) is suggesting the achievement of a Memorial dedicated to General Anders, which will be installed in Imola, in Anders Park in 2020.
The association has already requested and obtained the patronage of the City of Imola, and of the Embassy and the Consulate of the Republic of Poland, and will request it from the Ministry of Heritage Cultural / Tourism, Defense and Education of Italy and Poland, of the presidencies of the Italian and Polish Republic, of the European Parliament and of the Embassies of the nations crossed by the II Army Corps of the Polish Army.
A strip of land in the Imola area will become a place of memory, a green area for everyone.
Near the Coraglia, where the outposts of the Polish troops who freed Imola passed end of the Second World War, at Via della Resistenza and contained by Via Molino
Vecchio, there is a piece of land that already bears the name of the General; this place is destined to become a public park with the vocation of memory, the memory of an epic itinerary, that of the Polish commanded by General Anders.
General Anders will be represented in a sitting position.
Such an unconventional position intends to show the Polish General either as a strategist, a wise and skillful
politician and a teacher.
He will be depicted as a teacher at his desk, with a book under his right hand and the other pointing at the geographical
itinerary (that is, his skills as a strategist). Then, his seat will show his political abilities and his sitting position is going to
make him look like a noble Renaissance Prince, wise and open-minded.
A memorial to live.
Every corner of the area, whose urban green design and architectural elements are in the study of two schools of which Imola boasts the existence, will be voted to recover urbanistic values and artistic, as well as to convey other emotions, of which part will be the Monument to the Polish Soldier, the Children of Hope and the Wojtek Bear, appropriately lowered to the entrances of an area that will be celebratory, but also of play and leisure.