Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava, Slovakia
The Slovak National Gallery (Slovak: Slovenská národná galéria, abbreviated SNG) is a network of galleries in Slovakia. It has its headquarters in Bratislava.
The gallery was established by law on 29 July 1949. In Bratislava, it has its displays situated in Esterházy Palace (Esterházyho palác) and the Water Barracks (Vodné kasárne) which are adjacent to each other. The Esterházy Palace was reconstructed for the purposes of the gallery in the 1950s and a modern extension was added in the 1970s.
The SNG also manages other galleries outside Bratislava: at the Zvolen Castle in Zvolen, at the Strážky mansion in Spišská Belá, in Ružomberok and in Pezinok. The Mourning portrait of K. Horvath-Stansith is considered one of the most significant acquisitions of the Baroque art collections.
Mission
In its foundation deed, the Slovak National Gallery (SNG) is defined as the supreme and central gallery institution of Slovakia.
Its activities and the extent of its collections contribute to the fulfilment of this requirement in the spirit of the conceptions for the building and management of the SNG. The SNG can be understood as a gallery institution creating collections which fulfil the expectations of the expert and general public; its role is to develop as the national art historical institution and, at the same time, to collect, preserve and interpret works of art at home and abroad.
We would like to present the Slovak National Gallery as an open institution built and operating on fundamental museum standards, which are not only maintained, but also renewed and advanced. A gallery should not only be the source of significant curatorial initiatives and quality projects and their presentations, but also the site of discussions and interpretation platforms and eventually even the guarantor of artistic and creative values.
In practice, this means an ambitious and legible dramaturgy of individual research, acquisition, exhibition and publication projects, without narrowing their conceptual, thematic and stylistic dimension, modifying the mission of the SNG or devaluing or inflating new, old, domestic and international art.
Slovak National Gallery, besides its premises in Bratislava, consists of a network of four branch gallery facilities: Castle in Zvolen, Mansion of Strážky in Spišská Belá, Ľudovít Fulla Gallery in Ružomberok and Gallery of Naïve Art in Pezinok-Cajla.
History
During the existence of the First Slovak Republic, the Slovak Gallery was founded in Bratislava in 1943. However, the Slovak National Gallery was established after the war and the communist coup d’état in 1948 by Act of the Slovak National Council no. 24 of 29 July 1948. The establishment was promoted mainly by the Communist poet, journalist and writer Laco Novomeský, at that time the commissioner for education, science and art. The management of the gallery was first entrusted to a six-member curator (Vladimír Wagner – director of the curator, Miloš Jurkovič – director of the Slovak Museum, Ján Mudroch – since 1950 the RectorAcademy of Fine Arts in Bratislava, Jozef Kostka, Milan Škorupa, J. Dubnický – ex offo member and Alžbeta Günterová-Mayerová). The first curatorial session was held on 7 January 1949. The first exhibition in 1949 was the “Exhibition of Old Master Paintings from the SNG Collections”, whose Commissioners were Günter-Mayer and Ľudmila Kraskovská. It was a traveling exhibition reinstalled in Partizánske, Martin and Košice. In the period up to 1970, the gallery was led by Karol Vaculík as its director.
The Slovak National Gallery was established by the Slovak National Council by law (Act No. 24 of 29 July 1948). This is relatively late for Europe and it was the result of Slovak ambitions are the war, promoted mainly by Ladislav Novomeský. Historically, it created as a traditional museum of Fine Arts of local as well as wider European provenance. From the beginning, the collection of artworks from the 20th century as well as mapping the contemporary artistic culture was a vital task of the Gallery.
In the course of its development, the collections were expanded to include other spheres of visual culture. The SNG was enriching its activities by the acquisition of artefacts of Applied Art, Design, Photography and Stage Design and exploring the specific phenomenon of Naïve Art. Later, the collectors’ program expanded to include artefacts associated with the development of Architecture and Other Media.
The collection of the SNG includes now about 70,000 items, many of which are part of the national cultural heritage. The Gallery fulfils an invaluable role in the area of protection and care for monuments of tangible and intangible cultural heritage (several buildings where the Gallery resides are national monuments). The SNG became the guardian and caretaker of the national cultural heritage in the area of historical but also modern and contemporary art culture over the years and its influence spread from Bratislava into other parts of Slovakia.
SNG Today – The complex of buildings in Bratislava comprises of the original structure of the Baroque Water Barracks with an additional structure (the bridge and administrative building from the 1970s) and the Esterházy Palace (built in 1870).
Intensive discussion concerning the official seat of the Slovak National Gallery began right after its founding. The premises of the former Water Barracks on the Danube River banks were allocated for the needs of this institution at the end of 1950 and the beginning of 1951. The gates of the gallery were opened for the general public on May 9, 1955, when the reconstruction of the premises was completed (interior by arch. F. Florians and interior by arch. K. Rozmány). Shortly after the opening, the gallery management stated that the premises of the Water Barracks did not fit the gallery’s needs in terms of capacity.
In 1963, The Association of Slovak Architects was asked to design an additional structure for the Slovak National Gallery in Bratislava. Four teams of authors participated in this competition and the commission evaluated them in the following order: the design of arch. V. Dedeček was the best; the team of prof. E. Kramár took second place; the team of professor prof. J. Frágner finished third and the team of arch. M. Beňuška (town-planning design) was fourth.
The winning design underwent several expert analyses and assessments and the original was suitably re-done by architect V. Dedeček. The final design differentiated the individual structures and floors according to height and mass. The architect opened the view in the courtyard and the Water Barracks by lifting the river bank wing of the building so that the structure on the columns was replaced by a bridge construction, i.e., “the Bridge” (designed in cooperation with the engineers from Mostárne Brezno factory).
The new premises included permanent exposition space (The Bridge), the administrative building, the amphitheatre and library. The difference between the architectural designs (1963 and 1968) also reflects the opinion shift in the architecture of the 1960s and 1970s. The concept, whose torso was realised, celebrates and even monumentalises the revival of architecture in the 1960s. The building was ceremonially opened on 1 March 1977 with the opening of the permanent expositions to the general public.
Despite the permanent decrease of prices of materials and technologies and many construction shortcomings, the building of the premises was a rare project in Slovakia. It was not only the first modern structure in the field of culture, but it is still the only new large gallery structure in Slovakia.
The Slovak National Gallery is working on plans for the reconstruction of the entire premises (Martin Kusý, Pavol Paňák and team – the studio Architekti BKPŠ, are the authors of the design).
Reconstruction
The reconstruction, modernization and completion of the SNG building will begin in mid-January 2016. The project price is set at 45.6 mil. According to TASR, “the SNG bridge, library, amphitheater, administrative building, historic Water Barracks building, which has the status of a national cultural monument, should be repaired. A new building of the depository house will be added, the courtyard, the farmyard, the connecting aisle and the pavements will be restored. ”
The technical state of disrepair of the SNG building in Bratislava resulted in a radical step by director Katarína Bajcurová, who as of 1 March 2001, decided to close down the exhibition spaces of the SNG bridge. Inconsistent project construction, installation of worn-out technology and the use of poor quality materials, as well as the problematic “repair” of the leaking glass roof, all contributed to the fact that after 24 years the bridge became unsuitable for exhibition purposes. Thus the gallery had to close off approximately 1,800 m² of its exhibition space designated particularly for temporary exhibitions.
As a result of this decision, the gallery faced a wave of negative criticism from the population, the city’s chief architect and certain parts of the expert public. Post-revolution voices brought to life called for the removal of the bridge, although former party and governmental buildings have fulfilled and fulfil new functions in the city without such radical architectural interventions. The employees of the gallery, a certain part of the domestic expert public and voices from neighbouring countries promoted the preservation of the building in public discussion.
In 2001 the SNG management, together with the Ministry of Culture of the SR, decided to deal with this state of emergency by implementing an investment plan for the reconstruction and modernization, or completion of construction of the SNG premises (in the period of 2004 – 2005, the first part- the reconstruction and modernization of the Esterházy Palace according to the project of Ing. arch. Rosica Borščová was carried out).
The construction plan of 2001 called for necessary repairs but without a principal re-evaluation of the complex. Yet it was the functional re-evaluation of the complex that appeared to be necessary to ensure the resolution of the problem of the never completed gallery premises. Even moreso since the concept, which director Bajcurová succeeded with in her campaign for the post, also incorporated the so called development model of the SNG, i.e., the building of a multi-functional gallery facility corresponding to European standards of the 21st century. The continuous threat of floods of the Danube River contributed to the re-evaluation of the spatial concept of the premises, and the bursting of the water pipes in October 2004, resulted in damage to collection items in the basement depository.
The gallery decided to search for a solution in the form of a public architecture tender. Only the second tender for the reconstruction and modernization of the SNG premises brought results (2005, chair of the jury: architect Gustav Peichl) with more specified terms and conditions respecting the new functional requirements. Studio Architekti BKPŠ Kusý – Paňák were selected.
Collections
The Slovak National Gallery was founded in 1948 and a significant part of its academic expertise was dedicated to research and presentation of Old Art from its very beginning – not only Slovak Art and not only from Slovakia. This seemingly trite statement may prove to be surprising, if one considers the situation of the 1950s in the context of contemporary cultural politics. On one hand, state institutions were enriched by the funds from confiscated property on the basis of Beneš decrees, on the other hand, particularly sacral art was put aside. Nevertheless, acquisitions and gifts formed the core of the collection of classical art from the very beginning. Gothic and Baroque sacral artworks are also given the necessary attention through acquisition, restoration and, in the 1970s, even presentation, whether in Zvolen Castle, or the central SNG in Bratislava.
The Slovak National Gallery is currently curating the following collections: Collection of Gothic Art, Collection of Baroque Art and Collection of Old Drawings and Graphic Art, Collection of Old European Art and Collection of 19th Century Art.
Because of the reconstruction of main SNG building in Bratislava, only a fraction of the Old Art Collection is on exhibition in the capital city – SNG Non-Permanent Exhibition. Large parts of the Collection of Gothic Art and the Collection of European Art of 16th – 18th Century are presented as part of permanent exhibitions of SNG in Zvolent Castle. Visitors can also find works of Master Paul of Levoča (copies made during restorations in the 1950s), and the transfers of wall paintings from the “Zvolen Rectory” and small collection of icons.
Zvolen is also key facility for maintenance of old art deposits. Strážky Chateau near Kežmarok is also very important when it comes to classical art. The permanent exhibition of portrait and works of Ladislav Mednyánszky is housed here.
Modern and Contemporary Art
The collections of Modern and Contemporary Art are among the most extensive at the Slovak National Gallery. The SNG acquired the first works for these collections almost immediately after its founding in 1948. At that time, it consisted of the work of classical fine art disciplines such as painting, plastic art, graphic art and drawing, which continues to be its foundation while also forming a representative collection of Slovak fine art of the 20th century.
Individual collections map the development of their disciplines, reflect style and opinion lines and record individual artistic acts of the most significant Slovak, European and international artists.
The new collections that were created in the following years were a manifestation of adjustment in the strategy and concept of the SNG collections, which sensitively reacted to the changing situation in 20th century art. Based on the shifts of traditional media of the art scene, the boundaries of classical disciplines were gradually disturbed and began to mutually overlap. Individual media such as painting and sculpting began to expand not only beyond the boundaries of its own artistic type, but also in space; eventually they also integrated the element of time and motion, by means of which the collection of an inter-media character was formed along with – and as a result of the onset of digital representations – the collection of new media.
Current events
In January 2014, it was announced that this year the admission to the gallery will be free thanks to the sponsorship of J & T BANKA. The agreement with the financial institution envisages an amount of € 60,000 collected by the gallery during the year 2012 for an entrance fee of 80,000 visitors. In 2012, the gallery had a profit of almost € 8,000.
Reconstruction 2016
The reconstruction, modernization and completion of the SNG building will begin in mid-January 2016. The project price is set at 45.6 mil. According to TASR, “the SNG bridge, library, amphitheater, administrative building, historic Water Barracks building, which has the status of a national cultural monument, should be repaired. A new building of the depository house will be added, the courtyard, the farmyard, the connecting aisle and the pavements will be restored. ”