The Victor sculpture and the stone block with the Czech lion

Jan Štursa (1880–1925) was one of the founders of Czech modern sculpture. In contrast to the classical aus-terity of J. V. Myslbek and the expressive structuralism of Otto Gutfreund, he brought to Czechoslovak mod-ern sculpture a dream, emotional stirring, sensitivity, sensuality and enchantment. He has been described as a vitalist, which he demonstrated in a series of sculptures dedicated to the theme of the solidly built and dynam-ic movement of the human body (Eva 1908, Sulamit Rahu 1910-1911). He achieved a new balance of emo-tional and constructive components in Resting Dancer (1913). In the spirit of the Neo-Classical emphasis on physical beauty and an energetic sense of life, he sculpted the larger-than-life sculpture Work and Humanity (1912-1913) for Prague’s Hlávkův Bridge. He himself finally chose voluntary death in 1925 in the face of an incurable illness. The Czech sculptor and draughtsman Josef Wagener (1901–1957) remembered his teacher in 1934 as follows: “Whenever I recall Jan Štursa, I always think of a bright, sunny day, a full and beautiful sum-mer morning.”

 

Jan Štursa enjoyed working with prominent architects: after 1910 he became sculptor for

the architectural projects of Jan Kotěra (1871–1923) and later worked for Kotěra’s pupil Josef Gočár (1880–1945).

 

The sculpture of the Victor was originally part of the monument to the writer Svatopluk Čech (1846–1908), realized in 1918-1921, but the work was present in the sculptor’s work until his death. Thanks to this work and the sculpture of the Wounded Man, which became a symbol of the new Czechoslovak statehood (it used to be placed in the Parliament and President Masaryk took his oaths under it), Štursa was written and spoken of as “the poet and sculptor of youth”. The Victor has its antecedents in Winged Victory of Samothrace, a dynamic, winged and flowing statue from the classical Hellenistic period, which was moved to the Louvre staircase after its discovery in 1863. Nike was the goddess of victory in classical mythology. Štursa understood the Vic-tor as a victorious creative idea, but one that also represented

the courage and strong youth of the new re-public. At the same time, the young man becomes a genius and protector of the place. Štursa thought of him as the shield of the new world.

 

In 1925, a monumental bronze sculpture of the Victor with a lime branch was installed in

the façade of the Czechoslovak pavilion at the Decorative Arts Exhibition in Paris. Štursa did not attend the ceremony, but on the same day his sculpture The Gift of Heaven and Earth was unveiled at the Modern Gallery in Prague, after which Štursa went to his studio at

the Academy of Fine Arts and shot himself. He died five days later. The sculpture of the Victor was the centerpiece of the architectural composition of the Czechoslovak pavilion at

the international exhibition, for which the architect Josef Gočár was awarded the Gold Medal, the Order of the Legion of Honor, and the Grand Prize. From this successful exhibition, on

the advice of Gočár, the Hradec Králové councilors purchased, in addition to the Victor, Gutfreund’s stone emblem with a lion and a Slovak double-armed cross. The relief was set directly into the architecture of the pavilion, which combined smooth plaster and unplastered masonry. These materials were then used by Gočár in the adaptation of the relief in Hradec Králové, this composition of materials together forming an effective contrast and balanced architec-tural composition. Gutfreund’s lion stands in front of the south wing facing Tylovo nábřeží Embankment. The years “1925–27” are carved into the emblem itself. In addition to Štursa’s Victor and Gutfreund’s relief of a lion with a cross, there was also a fountain with

a sculpture in front of the Czechoslovak pavilion at the Paris exhibition – a bronze sculpture of the Motorcyclist by Otokar Švec.

 

After the completion of the grammar school building designed by Josef Gočár, the sculpture of the Victor was mounted on a high pedestal. While in the pavilion building at the Paris exhibition the sculpture was placed at the very top of the building, in Hradec Králové it stands alone and the grammar school building forms its back-ground. The Paris exhibition ended in October 1925 and it is said that the Victor was transported to Hradec Králové immediately from the exhibition. Therefore, it was installed after Štursa’s death. A bronze sculpture can have up to five casts, Štursa’s Victor has two – the second cast is located in Prague in front of the Queen Anne’s Summer Palace, where it took its place after the exhibition of Jan Štursa and his students in 1977.

 

The city of Hradec Králové was to have one more of Štursa’s magnificent sculptures, namely the monument to President Masaryk on today’s Masarykovo náměstí Square. However, since the sculptor died prematurely, Otto Gutfreund created it in collaboration with architect Josef Gočár.

 

JFB