February 19 2018 | By Collin Abdallah for ArchDaily
How Slovakia’s Soviet Ties Led to a Unique Form of Extraterrestrial-Influenced Architecture
(Above: Memorial and Museum of the Slovak National Uprising, by architect Dušan Kuzma, 1963-1970. Banská Bystrica, Slovakia. Image © Stefano Perego)
The history of Slovakia is riddled with political unrest and unwanted occupation, with the Slovak people having repeatedly been denied a voice throughout history. In the years following World War I, Slovakia was forced into the common state of Czechoslovakia; the territory was dismembered by the Nazi regime in 1938 and occupied by the Nazis for most of the Second World War, before being eventually liberated by Soviet and Romanian forces in 1945. Over the next four decades of communist rule—first by communists within Czechoslovakia itself and then later by the Soviet Union—the architecture of Slovakia came to develop into a unique form of sci-fi postmodernism that celebrated the shift in industrial influence at the time.
There were, however, a small class of architects who turned against the standardization of industrialist design, and turned instead toward postmodernism and “High-Tech.” [3] These designs are what would today be associated with sci-fi and outer-space, and are accentuated by the technological advances of the time, and perhaps the Space Race between the Soviet Union and the United States during the 1960s and 70s.
A great example of the influence of these Soviet tendencies is Slovakia is the “UFO” by Juraj Hovorka, a great example of extraterrestrial-influenced architecture. The monument is located in an area called Medzijarky, a small park just east of the center of Bratislava. A complicated and at times neglected country, Slovakia possesses many architectural gems that not only allude to their troubled past but provide a unique contribution to the history of Soviet architecture and postmodernism in Eastern Europe.
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