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Young Artists Protest Against Creator of New Svatopluk Statue
Monday 07 June 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, June 7 (TASR) - A group of young artists with red banners resembling those from communist times protested against Jan Kulich, the creator of the new Svatopluk statue, at the unveiling ceremony on Sunday evening also attended by the country's three top constitutional officials - President Ivan Gasparovic, Parliamentary Chairman Pavol Paska and Prime Minister Robert Fico.
"I'm a graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts and Design (VSVU), which was normalised by Mr. Kulich as rector for many years," Michal Moravcik told TASR.
Sculptor Jan Kulich was rector of VSVU between 1973-89. He received many orders under communism, including for another statue currently on castle hill - "Welcoming", which stands in front of the Parliament building.
"Most of us are graphic designers and we came to protest against the fact that such a person was given the right to express himself in a public space," said Moravcik, according to whom the hiring of a prominent sculptor from the communist period points to the attitude of the current political elite. "It's a step backwards," he told TASR.
"He (Kulich) didn't allow many talented people to be accepted and to function normally in the artistic sphere. And, of course, he and other artists linked to the Czechoslovak Communist Party (KSC) filled spaces with disgusting ideological productions," stated Moravcik.
Conversely, academic sculptor Ladislav Sabo, who worked on the Svatopluk state, is proud of the almost-eight-metre-tall monument. "He's my teacher," he said about Kulich.
In his speech, Parliamentary Chairman Pavol Paska praised the work of all who contributed to the statue. "Let me thank the creators of this monumental work for this gift," he said.
The statue has met with loud protests from the Slovak cultural community. Dozens of renowned Slovak cultural personalities sent an open letter to the three constitutional officials that included criticism of the timing of the unveiling ceremony (less than a week before the general election).
In the letter, the artists claimed that the statue is a "pseudo-symbol" demonstrating a return to the aestethics of the so-called normalisation period after the crushing of the Prague Spring in 1968. They also described Kulich as "court sculptor of the Communist Party".
[Slovak nationalists claim that Svatopluk and his realm of Great Moravia in the 9th century were inherently Slovak, but most historians agree that a distinctly Slovak identity didn't emerge until a couple of centuries after his death. - ed. note].
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