The minister wants equal access to culture as to healthcare

Prague – Equal access to culture throughout the country should be as self-evident as equal access to quality healthcare. Although the capital city lacks, for example, a modern concert hall and the construction of a new building for the National Library is likely necessary, the cultural infrastructure in the regions is significantly neglected. In an interview with ČTK today, Minister of Culture Lubomír Zaorálek (ČSSD) said this. According to him, the state invests billions in the restoration of monuments but is unable to ensure their perfect use and integrate them into people's lives, even in collaboration with local governments.

The state has long been asleep on the issue of providing space for cultural institutions and at the same time in its effort or willingness to come up with something that will represent contemporary architecture. "To this day, I regret that a library building was not created according to the design of Jan Kaplický," he said. He regrets that Prague gave up and believes that today people would appreciate the futuristic building – similar to how the concert hall in Hamburg has become beloved, which was criticized and condemned during its creation. Today, it attracts thousands of visitors daily, and tickets for concerts there are sold out for two years in advance.

However, in the case of the Czech National Library, a new building will probably be a necessity, according to him. "There simply won't be anywhere to put the books. The Klementinum, as the current main seat of the library, should be reconstructed and regain its baroque form. But finding a compromise between the demands of preservationists and librarians in this case seems impossible," he stated. After the state rejected Kaplický's blob, the NK's funds are largely in storages in Hostivař, from where books are transported to the center at Klementinum several times a week.

The minister also misses a modern concert hall, the necessity of which Prague has been discussing for many years. "For years, there has been empty meditation around the Philharmonic. If music is the most celebrated area of Czech culture, why hasn't at least one building been built here that equals what they have in Germany, even in several variations?" the minister asks.

More than the indecision to invest in a large cultural building, he reportedly dislikes the unequal access to culture in the country as a whole. "There is talk of equal access to healthcare, so we should also talk about equal access to culture," he believes. If the state resigns on this, it will not have satisfied residents in cities and municipalities like in Germany, where there is appropriate amenities. "We will have a country where small municipalities will continue to depopulate because we cannot provide them with functions that make life in their area fulfilling," he said.

"We must live with monuments and integrate them into life, not just pour money into them so that the shell is finished. That is the main principle today; everything is made a part of life, we have architects to finalize it, and we do it half-heartedly," he mentioned, for example, in connection with the National Museum or the State Opera, whose renovations cost billions, but visitors need to reach them either through several pedestrian crossings on the main thoroughfare or via a polluted underpass. "I would send someone at Prague City Hall to the fiery depths for not being able to agree on it," he touched upon the years-long promises of the Prague magistrate to solve the problem with the thoroughfare, which cuts off the museum and opera from Wenceslas Square.