Friday, June 27, Prague
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Statue of Franz Kafka
Head of Franz Kafka, a kinetic sculpture. It consists of 42 individual rotating metal panels that form the face of the author Franz Kafka. The layers move independently, turning the sculpture from a recognizable head into an abstract mass of reflective metal before aligning again.
Born in 1369, Jan Hus was an influential religious thinker, philosopher, and reformer in Prague. He was a key predecessor to the Protestant movement of the sixteenth century. In his works he criticized religious moral decay of the Catholic Church. Hus was condemned by the Council of Constance and burned at the stake in 1415. This led to the Hussite Wars. The Jan Hus Memorial depicts victorious Hussite warriors and Protestants who were forced into exile 200 years after Hus in the wake of the lost Battle of the White Mountain during the Thirty Years' War.
The Klausen Synagogue is the largest synagogue in the former Prague Jewish ghetto and the sole example of an early Baroque synagogue in the ghetto.
The Old Jewish Cemetery, established in the 15th century. It contains approximately 12,000 visible tombstones, with burials stacked up to 12 deep. Because Jewish custom prohibits the removal of old graves, new layers of soil were added over time, causing the crowded appearance of the headstones. |
