The Lidice Gallery is situated in the middle of the new Lidice village, approximately 500 metres from the premises of the Lidice Memorial museum.
The Gallery building
Originally it was built to a design of the architect František Marek as a community centre. The construction works began in 1957. After 1989 it became a private property and stopped being used for its original purpose. The dilapidated building was taken over by the state and converted to its current use in 2002–2003. Featuring the architectural style typical for that period, supplemented with elements of decorativism, the building with the neighbouring restaurant Lidice Gallery and the shops has remained a natural social centre of the village.
In the open area in front of the building there is a monument “Carrara for Lidice” from 1962. The relief of Carrara marble is set into a granite stele made to a design of the architect František Maria Cerný (renowned for his remodelling of the frontage of the church Na Slovanech in Prague). It depicts a nude male figure using a gunstock to kill three vipers symbolising fascism (perhaps its German, Italian, Spanish or Japanese versions). The relief style reminiscing Roman Antiquity still draws upon the official Italian style of the 1930s and 1940s. It is the first art piece donated, as the sign says, by the partisan Carrara to the martyred Lidice.
The gallery space opens to the garden where cultural events are held in sunny weather and where some of the sculpted items of the Lidice Collection can be found.
ROOM FOR EXHIBITIONS AND CULTURE EVENTS
The ground floor of the building has the permanent exhibition of the Lidice Collection made up of gifts to Lidice from artists from all over the world. The first floor holds regular short-term exhibitions while, from May to October, the marble hall on the 1st floor hosts the current edition of the International Children’s Exhibition of Fine Arts Lidice. The Lidice Gallery plays host to cultural events, concerts and theatrical performances.
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