Jože Plečnik at the Prague Castle

A hundred years ago, President Tomáš G. Masaryk appointed Professor Jože Plečnik as Prague Castle architect. Up to then, Plečnik had spent ten years teaching at the Prague School of Applied Arts, guiding over fifty pupils there, many of whom went on to influence the development of Czech and Slovak architecture. It was with his architectural redevelopment at Prague Castle that Jože Plečnik conceived a grand residence for the Presidential Office of the New Republic, demonstrating originality by entwining historical architectural layers into a gracious and harmonious unified form. Due to the onset of Modernism in the 1930s and its later post-war form, Plečnik‘s true legacy was overshadowed for quite a time. Only by the turn of the 1960s then 1970s, with the postmodern movement and its new comprehensive re-evaluation of architecture and urbanism, did renewed interest awaken in his work, culminating in a grand retrospective exhibition at the Georges Pompidou Centre in 1986. And definitively, a quarter of a century ago, with a superlative presentation of his work ‘in situ’ directly at Prague Castle. This meant from then on, the name Jože Plečnik could reap ultimate satisfaction with his inclusion among the world titans of 20th Century architecture. This current exhibition is divided into two sections. The first recalls not only his grand reimagining of Prague Castle and the castle gardens but also his subsequent work in Prague and its environs. The second segment showcases his creations in the Lány Chateau and park surroundings and also introduces an appreciation of his work in his native Ljubljana, Slovenia. Vladimír Šlapeta Exhibition Curator

In the Treresian Wing of the Old Royal Palace you can see the exhibition Saša Fuis Photographs – Jože Plečnik National and University Library, introducing to the visitors the interiors of the National Library building, whose architect is Josip Plečnik, through photographs by Saša Fuis.