Zprávy památkové péče 2018, 78(5):445-456 | DOI: 10.56112/zpp.2018.5.05

Architect Dušan Jurkovič as the government commissioner for the protection of heritage properties in Slovakia in 1919-1922

Martina Orosová

Pamiatkový úrad SR

After the establishment of the Czechoslovak Republic, a small number of Slovak intelligence officers were called into state services to help build the public administrative structures of the democratic establishment. One of them was architect Dušan Jurkovič, who lived and worked in Moravia and was considered to be the most important Slovakian artist and supporter of Czech-Slovak relations. The Minister with Power of Attorney for Slovakia, Vavro Šrobár, appointed him as a government commissioner for the protection of monuments (heritage properties) in Slovakia from 1 April 1919. Dušan Jurkovič had to build a commissariat for the protection of monuments in Bratislava from the ground up, with a small number of employees, without adequate security. His competence was defined by a government order on the powers of the governmental commission for the protection of heritage properties in Slovakia, signed by Šrobár on 20 October 1919. This was the very first regulation on the protection of monuments in the Slovak Republic covering all buildings built before 1850. It concerned the protection of nature, art collections, and museums. Dušan Jurkovič pursued his activity in accordance with the official state cultural policy based on the idea of Czechoslovak national unity. It aimed for the overall cultural uplifting of the population, which Jurkovič saw first and foremost through raising the overall living standards of all levels of the population. The lack of real state support in his case, however, was very disappointing. His position was burdened by the general political tensions and centralist policies of government bodies that sought to abolish Šrobar's government decrees and rather pursue only the agenda of the Prague Ministries. The fate of the governmental commission for the protection of monuments in Slovakia was bound to the existence of an educational report which, together with papers for the Roman Catholic and Evangelical Church, was merged into a Report of the Ministry of Education and National Enlightenment in Bratislava. Jurkovič became the head of the education department and served there until the end of 1922, but this did not satisfy him. On 1 June 1922, the agenda for the protection of monuments and museums was transferred to the state office for the preservation of monuments in Slovakia under the supervision of Václav Chaloupecký, archive inspector and librarian. Jurkovič resigned from state service and returned to active architectural work.

Keywords: Dušan Jurkovič, Slovakia, heritage protection, government commissioner, national education

Published: December 1, 2018  Show citation