The author of the photographs and the organizer of John Paul II’s mountain excursions visited his Family Home.

Before the premiere of the film „Apartment”, on May 15, Angelo Gugel, Pope’s John Paul II chamber assistant, Egildo Biocca, a Vatican Gendarme, and Arturo Mari, a papal photographer, visited the John Paul II’s Family Home in Wadowice. All three worked with John Paul II during his pontificate. They came to Krakow to attend the premiere of the film „Apartment”, which had been created using images shot over several years by the Pope’s butler. Some of the same images can be seen exhibited at our museum, in the area dedicated to the John Paul II’s love for the mountains.

Visiting the John Paul II’s Family Home, they recalled with emotion their experiences related to important moments of the pontificate of our beloved Pope. Angelo Gugel, recalled that the Pope, before making his inaugural speech, on 22 October 1978, asked him if he could possibly correct his accent in Italian, the language in which he had to speak. There was nothing to correct – said A. Gugel, who so far had never given interviews, and never spoken about topics related to John Paul II. The utmost discretion has always been linked to his work. However, it was he who for more than 15 years, with the permission of the Pope’s secretary, Father Dziwisz and John Paul II himself, was recording with an amateur camera the private vacations and excursions of John Paul II in the Italian Alps. From the selection of those recordings it was created a unique film „The Apartment”, a story on John Paul II’s excursions, which is now showing in cinemas.