Beautiful or Beastly? Brutalism in Prague
Many people are repulsed by the concrete architecture of the 1960s and ‘70s. Even in otherwise beautiful Prague, brutalist architecture is well represented and hotly debated. What speaks for its preservation?
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00:00 Picturesque and stunningly beautiful. That's how we think of the Czech capital Prague.
00:07 But this too is Prague. The bare concrete, angular forms and simple design that characterise
00:15 the architectural style of the 1960s and 70s called Brutalism.
00:21 Not everyone loves these buildings here. Many have even been demolished in recent years.
00:29 Art historian Luka Šveverka thinks this is wrong. Together with other historians and
00:34 architects he's campaigning for the preservation of Brutalist architecture.
00:38 It's a print of the time. So for me as an art historian it's very important to have
00:44 them because through them we can understand the age, the people, the tendencies and the
00:50 architectural theories and also the thinking about the city.
00:55 Brutalism originated in Britain and arrived in Prague in the 1960s when the Czech Republic
00:59 was still under the Soviet Union's influence. Buildings like the former Assembly building
01:03 are still often viewed through political lenses.
01:06 A lot of people could say that it's connected with communism itself. But the building itself
01:13 is very modern and it reflects the western architecture of the time. It was designed
01:20 in the late 60s by Karol Prager who was very in touch with the tendencies of the 1960s
01:28 in western art and architecture.
01:32 So Brutalism wasn't a Soviet invention. Its founders aimed to create honest, simple and
01:37 functional architecture with bold forms and bare materials. Today Brutalist buildings
01:42 can be found all over the world. But are buildings like the Barbican Estate in London beautiful?
01:49 I wouldn't say pretty because pretty is not a good aesthetic class. But I would say interesting,
01:56 I would say sculptural, I would say appealing because Brutalism buildings should be about
02:03 appeal, about thinking and about the contrast that they are making.
02:10 This building, the Hotel Intercontinental, is one of the two remaining entirely Brutalist
02:15 buildings in Prague. Bare concrete, geometric shapes and no blending with other styles,
02:21 it's currently under renovation. A controversial undertaking.
02:27 In other cases, renovation could have saved buildings. This 1970s building, once the Czechoslovakian
02:34 Transgas Company offices, no longer exists.
02:39 Despite many protests by architects, historians and activists, the new owners got their way
02:45 and it was demolished in 2019. They promised to put a residential building on the site
02:49 but four years later nothing's happening here.
02:53 The demolitions often just left the place in a state like this. So that's the main problem.
03:00 If the buildings would be replaced by something interesting or for a lot of people, for general
03:07 public, not only for the owners of the new buildings, it would be respectable.
03:12 Today, a few gas pipes are all that's left of the building.
03:19 But not all Brutalist buildings in Prague are unpopular or endangered. The Nova Sena
03:26 National Theatre is even a listed building.
03:33 So how do these different appraisals come about?
03:40 It seems that the people at the Ministry of Culture have their own opinion based on aesthetics.
03:47 So that's the problem. They are deciding and they are seeing it by the optic of the
03:54 general public, which sometimes doesn't recognise the value of it, of the building.
04:01 In this case, Brutalism has even prevailed over the more generally appreciated Gothic
04:06 and Baroque styles. Prague's Emmaus Monastery, originally from the 14th century, was badly
04:12 damaged in the Second World War.
04:15 The competition to rebuild the towers was won by a Brutalist design, even if some citizens
04:21 would have preferred a reconstruction true to the original.
04:26 I think this kind of architecture is the kind that appeals on feelings that should be appealed.
04:34 These kind of buildings, they were interesting at the time they were built. And after 60
04:40 or 70 years, we are still fighting for them or against them.
04:45 So the question remains, how do we deal with architecture that's fallen out of fashion?
04:50 Do we tear it down? Or do we leave it standing as a messenger from times past?
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