Name: Torchbearer
Author: Marek Pražák
Dating: 2001
Location: on the console of the rear facade of the Faculty of Economics facing Dr. Šmerala Street in Moravian Ostrava
Execution: a figurative sculpture made of epoxy resin on a steel frame with brass wings carrying a miner’s lamp with illumination, 400 cm high
(FALLEN) ANGEL WITH A MINER’S LAMP
Marek Pražák found a place for his statue himself. For many years, he had felt provoked by an empty ledge on the ceramic facade of the Faculty of Economics, VŠB-TUO. The building was built thanks to the extension of the older part of the former Faculty of Metallurgy in the mid-1950s in the style of classicizing Socialist Realism. Today, the individual buildings form the whole city block, surrounded by busy streets in the centre of Ostrava.
The sculptor thought of the variants when creating the design. He imagined a vertical, provocative statue. From the initial motif of a woman walking off the ledge into the street space (Step), the author gradually reached the idea of a figure with a miner’s lamp illuminating the city from above with protective light. From the typical Ostrava depiction of lamps in the hands of miners on the facades of the surrounding buildings in the centre of Ostrava, he advanced to the idea of a lamp shining in the hands of an angel. The angel Torchbearer took the form of a vague androgynous being provocative through its obscurity and incomprehensibility. Unlike other stone lamps in the hands of stone miners, the Torchbearer’s lamp was supposed to be lit by electric light.
The ambiguous appearance of the statue with wings, a pointed cap and a bright blue body provokes various interpretations. Are we standing in front of a proud angel cast from heaven and condemned to an eternal precarious perch above the depths of a street, or a mining sprite? The Torchbearer is a Czech version of the name Lucifer. Does the Torchbearer’s lamp illuminate the way home for pilgrims, or does it shine somewhere up in the dark to mislead the pedestrians from their proper way on the pavement?
When the statue was placed on the ledge in 2001, the lamp in the Torchbearer’s hand actually shone. Because the electrical installation in the burner at an unreachable place high above the heads of pedestrians was not properly maintained, the Torchbearer’s light went out over time. The embellishing association For Beautiful Ostrava decided to restore the lighting; its members together with the author of the sculpture took the effort to repair the lamp (in collaboration with the Faculty of Economics of VŠB-TUO and the Municipal District of Moravian Ostrava and Přívoz).
In December 2013, on the winter solstice, the Torchbearer’s lamp was lit again ceremoniously.
