The ministry earmarked 1.9 billion crowns for the library, while Kaplicky's project would cost some four billion, Jehlicka (junior ruling Christian Democrats, KDU-CSL) said in Vaclav Moravec's Questions programme on CT. "As a minister I can never launch a construction of a building for which I do not have money.
I would thereby set a bad example for citizens," Jehlicka added. The London-based Future Systems studio of Czech-born architect Kaplicky won the international contest for the project, held according to the rules of the International Union of Architects (UIA) last year. Kaplicky's project of Over 1000 plates probably stolen at Terezin cemetery-Czech police ...
Czech antitrust office deals with National Library contest again ... a nine-storey building shaped as a broad pyramid with rounded edges, dubbed "octopus," has raised controversial reactions and divided the public as well as experts and politicians into its supporters and opponents. Teams of experts and politicians have been discussing the circumstances of the new library's seat for a couple of months now and the NK fears that it will not have the new premises in time. Jehlicka said today an international architectonic contest should not be called without setting a financial limit for the building. NK director Vlastimil Jezek said there was no political will to realise Kaplicky's design. "I do not much like the sentence: There is no money. It is much more correct to say: I do not want to give money to this," Jezek said in the TV debate programme. Opposition Social Democrat (CSSD) shadow culture minister Vitezslav Jandak agreed with Jezek, saying the additional two billion might be gained from the privatisation of the Czech Post or the Prague airport, for instance. Jandak said the senior ruling Civic Democrats (ODS) blocked the library building after Kaplicky's project won the contest. Jandak added the alternative proposal of National Gallery director Milan Knizkak to rebuild the Prague Congress Centre for the NK purposes would not be feasible either since it would also cost almost four billion crowns. The National Library, now seated in the Klementinum historical building in the centre of Prague, badly needs a new building because it is running out of capacity and the conditions for keeping books are not suitable. Jezek expressed fears that if the project were postponed all the time, the money would not suffice for any building in the end since the prices of construction works had been constantly rising. The only solution would then be to complete the NK depository in Prague-Hostivar and keep transporting books from there to Klementinum, Jezek said, calling it the worst possible alternative - costly and harming the environment and the book stock. He indicated he might resign from his post in such a case. ($1=16.340 crowns)
(Ceske Noviny)
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