Visiting Prague

Summary: history of the legend of Slavic princess Libuše integrating the history of the Vyšehrad and Prague itself.

Prague, the cosmopolitan capital of the Czech Republic, located along the Vltava River, in the middle of the Czech basin. Today, about 1.2 million people live in Prague, which is about 12% of the population of our country. Its populated area (about 500 km2) make it the largest city in the Czech Republic. Because of its prosperity and beauty of its monuments, the historical heart of Prague was placed on UNESCO’s list of protected monuments in 1992. Fairly, it is said that Prague is the most beautiful capital city in Europe.

The origin of the city of Prague goes back to the 7th century and the Slavic princess Libuše, the mother of the Přemysl dynasty. She was a great, intelligent woman and with extraordinary prophecy powers that gave her some visions about the way Prague took until it become the magnificent city that it is now.
Together with her husband, a humble ploughman by the name of Premysl they ruled peacefully over the Czech lands from the hill of Vyšehrad, a beautiful place where you can find Prague hotels, close to nature and history. One day, while facing the river Vltava pointed to a forested hill she spoke her vision:

“ . . . I see a large city, whose fame touches the stars . . . There in the woods by the Vltava River you will find a person who is hewing the threshold (práh) of his home and in accordance with this, you will name the city Praha (Prague) . . . ”
The princesses ordered her populace to build a castle where a man was building the threshold of a house. Her prophecy was follow and some two hundred years later, the city of Prague became the seat of the Premyslid dynasty.
It is thought that maybe because of the princess Libuše’s prophecies in the in the 11th century the first Bohemian King Vratislav II ordered to build in Vyšehrad the Capitular Church of St. Peter and Paul. Over the years the Church was rebuild but Charles IV.  sgave it a high-Gothic form in the 14th century. The Styled Baroque reconstructed came in 1720s and finally the church gained its neo-Gothic features in the 19th century. Both towers high pseudo-Gothic were added between 1902 and 1903. The present appearance come from Mocker Neo-gothic changeover which starts in 1885 and was finished in 1903.
You can compare spires of Church of St. Peter and Paul with Prague Castle St. Vitus Cathedral spires that comes from the equivalent time.
The inside of the church is adorned mostly with Art Noveau wall paintings. Inside of the church is the picture of Virgin Mary from the 14th century, an excellent Gothic painting, it is the most valuable one.
In Vyšehrad you can’t miss the cemetery. It is an significant resting place for many important people of the Czech Republic like composers, artists, sculptors, writers, scientists and politicians. Wonderfully ornamented and arranged with great care and respect towards names like A. Mucha, B. Smetana, A. Dvorak, it is nowadays more of an art object itself. In the graveyard rest common vaults of the most deserving men and women of the nation - Slavin - the group most responsible was the Svatobor Association. That’s why the name Slavin.
Once in Prague you can’t miss Vyšehrad (in the red line of the subway), a rich place with great park when you can play with your children, make a picnic, do joking or walk your dog, simply enjoying the nature.

Summary: life and work of Jan Saudek the photographer who found art in erotic freedom.

Jan Saudek was born in May 13 in the year of 1935 in Prague son of a bank clerk. Until he was 15 he was able to study but during the events of the II World War he and one of his brother, Karel were sent to a Children’s Concentration Camp close to the Polish border. Although the rest of his brothers and his father were sent to Theresienstadt. His father survived but six of is brothers were murdered.
After the war, in 1950 he started working for a printer. His First camera was a small Kodak and he says: “The only thing you can do with this camera is load the film and press the button to make a picture; that’s exactly what I did until 1963.” Following his work in the printer he was forced to complete his military service and married Marie with whom he has two children called Samuel and David. By this time he got inspiration in Eduard Steichen, a photographer, painter and art gallery and museum curator, to become a serious photographer. In 1969 he gets as a present his first real camera: a Flexaret 6 x 6. In the same year he makes a trip to U.S. of America where he met Hugh Edwards, an influential curator and the Art Institute of Chicago and responsible for the acceptance of the fine art of photography and documentary photography as forms of art. Hugh had recognized great quality in Jan’s work and encouraged him to keep on with it. Here he also has the opportunity to present his work with his first solo exhibition at the University of Indiana, Bloomington.
Returning to his homeland he realizes that Prague was still behind the Iron Curtin where art was not welcome. For that reason and because his work was full of themes of personal erotic freedom, and filled with implicitly political symbols of corruption and innocence, he had to work in a clandestine way in a cellar. In the 70’s he starts to be known in the West and internatinally as the leading Czech photographer developing a great number of followers in the Czech Republic. In the beginning of this decade he also divorced form his wife Marie.
In 1972 he works together with a variety of artists such as Paule Pia (Antwerp and Brussels), Karsten Fricke (Bonn), Marlene and Jean-Pierre Vorlet (Lausanne), Pierre Borhan (Paris), Anita Neugebauer (Basle) and David Travis (Art Institute of Chicago).
In 1977 he travels to France to see “Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie” he get to know Arles and Paris. But it is between 1976-84 that Jan works in collaboration with the Jacques Baruch Gallery in Chicago. The first monograph on Jan was named The World of Jan Saudek and was translated to English, German and French in 1983.
In 1983 his edits his fist book of his work in English and not in the Czech Republic.
Due to his enormous success, in 1984 the Czech communist authorities agree to let him to cease working in a factory, and gave him permission to apply for a permit to work as an artist. In 1984 he sign in the Unity of Czech Artists, whish had ignored him for a long time, but he says: “With my work I am trying to capture all the things I know and love; and above all I would like to leave behind a sign of the times that have elapsed.”
Saudek doesn’t stop growing and stretching his limits. This time he collaborates and exposed his work at the Galerie Torch in Amsterdam and by 1990 with the publishers Art Unlimited of Amsterdam. In 1989-91 its Japans time, he works for the fashion firm Matsuda.
His first rearward comes in 1990 with the when hi is made a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres
Sarah Saudek edits his first book Dopis (Letters), in the year of 1995. By this time his work had changed, he introduced painted elements to his works transferring important motifs from his photographic output to canvas. Two films were produced about this incredible and brave artist. One in 1990 by Jerome de Missolz called Jan Saudek: Prague Printemps, the other is named Jan Saudek: Bound by Passionit was produced in the current year 2008. by Adolf Zika.

Summary: impossible to be in Prague without visiting the Jewish Quarter. Here you will find here useful information like its history, location and tickets info.

The Jewish Quarter of Prague is situated in between the Old Town Square (Staré Mesto), served by the green line of subway of the same name, and the Vltava River, is now one of the biggest attractions of the city. In this area you will also find Prague Hotels where you will feel very comfortable. The Quarter is now known by the name of Josefov, the name comes from the emperor Josef II, whose reforms improved the living conditions for the Jewish in Prague. Prior to the Holocaust, and for many years, it was one of the most important Jewish centers in Europe. Documentary evidence divulges that Jews have subsisted in Prague since 970 C.E. In the end of the 11th Century, the Jewish community had been fully established. Dating the 13th century, the Jewish Quarter when the Jews were forced to leave their homes and move to this place. Over the years this area got more and more crowded since the Jews were not allowed to live among the others. During the events of the 1st and the 2nd world war the Quarter got a new designation: ghetto. Between the years of 1893-1913 suffered its biggest changes giving the buildings the appearance of nowadays, a real testimony tot eh history of Jews spanning many centuries.
The complex integrates Pinkas Synagogues, Klausen Synagogue, High Synagogue, Maisel Synagogue, Spanish Synagogue, the Jewish Town Hall and the Old Jewish Cemetery. Many people come up with the question of hwy this was never destroyed but even conserved during the 2nd world war? The answer is simple but terrifying. Hitler wanted to keep the Jewish living, synagogues and all rituals belonging intact so later he could make a museum of the exterminated people. Prague hotels near Jewish Quarter.
The historical sights of the Jewish Quarter are under the auspices of the Jewish Museum and a single ticket will give you the entrance to all of their buildings.
The Old-New Synagogue is the oldest preserved in Central Europe, built in the early gothic style in the late 13th century adorned by intricate stonework and with original furnishings. The Old-New Synagogue is extremely connected to the legend of the Golem. Rabbi Low had great powers and with them created the Golem, a sculpture made out of mud was vitalized.  Golem was created to protect Jews from Anti-Semitic attacks and Joseph had the necessary powers to carry out the task. Although the being grew stronger and stronger. Rather then an heroic and helpful deeds Golem was becoming increasingly uncontrollable and even destructive. Once people found him uprooting trees and destroying Rabbi’s home. Rabbi rushed to take out the table that give him life. This was the end of Golem– he was never re-vitalized. Although Rabbi continued with the psalm and because of the interruption Prague’s Old-new Synagogue is the only place in the whole world where this psalm is sung twice.
In the Czech Republic, about 26,000 members of the Czech Jewish community emigrated to various countries, like Palestine, U.S., South America and Western Europe. Not all Czech Jews were so lucky, 92,000 Jews remained in occupied Czech lands. Seventy-four thousand of the Czech Jews were jailed in Terezin and 80 percent of those were sent to Auschwitzz, Maidanekk, Treblinkaa and Sobiborr. Other Czech Jews were sent straight to death camps.
The Jewish Museum of Prague has one of the widest collections of Jewish art, textiles and silver in the world. There are 40,000 exhibits and 100,000 books. The collection is exceptional; everything in the museum was gathered from Bohemia and Moravia and recalls the Jewish history and a valuable heritage for the present Czech Republic.
Shelly Sugar specialized in tourist business, researcher of Czech Republic tourism, manly Prague accommodation and tours.