For years, local restaurateur and artist Bogusław Nowak publicly insulted Krzysztof Gwizdała, who organized Glina Show and Gliniada in Bolesławiec during the Ceramics Festival. Nowak claimed that his consent was required to paint oneself with clay and that he owned the Gliniada name. His consent was not required, however, and the restaurateur had no rights to the trademark. Bogusław Nowak did, however, have a group of loyal fans and followers who liked the restaurateur.
Several of his supporters argued that Nowak had rights to the event because Grażyna Hanaf (a journalist for istotne.pl and co-organizer of Glina Show and Gliniada) wrote an essay in Polityka in 2009 in which the sentence appeared: “Gliniada was invented by mime artist Bogdan Nowak.” The rest of the essay, however, stated that many people created the event, and that they themselves invented the characters they later portrayed, while also creating the spectacle-parade. Nowak was one of the actors and co-organizers.
It would seem that this should not have provoked anyone into years of attacks, vilification, defamation and attempts to destroy the festival of painting oneself with clay slip, which, since 2018, had been organized by residents of Bolesławiec without Bogusław Nowak, who had earlier refused to organize the event in Bolesławiec himself. Despite this, for six years Nowak insulted these people on social media and during public events.
His conduct, which can be described as verbal abuse, eventually led to him being sued by Krzysztof Gwizdała.
The first case had been ongoing since mid-2023. The second began in November 2024 and ended at a settlement hearing with an agreement and apologies (in both cases simultaneously).
Bogusław Nowak incurred financial obligations payable to the boleslawianie.eu association and Krzysztof Gwizdała, and published an apology on his Facebook profile and on the istotne.pl portal, which read:
I apologize for undermining confidence in Mr. Krzysztof Gwizdała and defaming him in connection with Glina Show and Gliniada.
Bogusław Nowak
Let us add that in 2023 Bogusław Nowak filed a copyright-protection lawsuit in a court in Poznań. The judge ruled in Krzysztof Gwizdała’s favor and explained to Bogusław Nowak why his lawsuit would fail. Nowak withdrew it, although he had previously asked the court in Poznań to prohibit Gwizdała from holding events under the name Gliniada and using the word Glinolud.
Despite his defeat in the Poznań court, Bogusław Nowak continued to claim that he alone had invented Gliniada (although in reality he was its face from 2009 to 2014), and that this gave him full ownership rights to the event. In August 2023, he also successfully disrupted an event created by the boleslawianie.eu association and istotne.pl.
The organizers of Glina Show and Gliniada eventually withdrew from organizing the event after not receiving a promise from Mayor Piotr Roman that the city would protect them from Nowak during the parade.
In 2024, Mayor Piotr Roman, after winning the local elections and to everyone’s surprise, entrusted the organization of the clay-painting event to... Bogusław Nowak. Nowak organized the event under the slogan “Parade Out of Love for Clay.” The city paid him PLN 50,000 for it. Almost another PLN 50,000 went to the artists who performed in Nowak’s parade.
