The architect failed with his constitutional complaint in the dispute with the Václav Havel Library

Brno - Architect Petr Pištěk was unsuccessful with his constitutional complaint in the dispute with the Václav Havel Library. He sought 300,000 crowns as compensation for damages related to the selection process for a proposal for an artistic installation at Prague airport. Courts at all levels gradually rejected his claim. A brief ruling from the Constitutional Court has recently been made available in its database.

Pištěk argued that the library incorrectly evaluated the selection process. According to him, the projects that placed in the top four did not meet the competition conditions, specifically the requirement for a digital exhibit based on touch control.

In the competition, architect Petr Franta succeeded with his proposal, while Pištěk finished fifth. The library denied any wrongdoing, stating through its legal representative that Pištěk did not correctly understand the competition conditions and wrongly interpreted the term digital exhibit.

Neither the District Court for Prague 1 nor the Municipal Court in Prague saw any fault in the library's conduct. The proposals that ranked higher than Pištěk's met the binding conditions because they included the use of digital technology. No strict requirements were set for its use, allowing the authors of the proposals to work with digital technology at their discretion. The decision was also confirmed by the Supreme Court.

Pištěk was also unsuccessful with his constitutional complaint. "The complainant again disputes the interpretation of the conditions under which the co-participant (Václav Havel Library) selected the awarded proposals; he does not provide any qualified constitutional legal argumentation that would demonstrate a violation of his basic rights by the general courts," the ruling states.

The artwork that was to replace the installation Forum Havlum by Bořek Šípek at Václav Havel Airport ultimately did not materialize. The airport abandoned the plan, primarily due to the coronavirus pandemic.