Chapel on the way

The Mikulovsko region is a land of many faces. Multilayered stories have become the basis for interventions by students who decided to strengthen the identity of the location through small interventions (often on the border of architecture and land art). The student works created at the Faculty of Architecture at VUT under the guidance of Barbora Ponešová and Jan Foretník were part of the NAKI project DF13P01OVV019 "Identification and interpretation of the origins, forms, and transformations of the baroque cultural landscape of the South Moravian borderlands." Other collaborators on the grant project included NPU ÚOP in Brno, ESF, and FF MU in Brno. Vojtěch Kolář chose the site of Rochusberg (now Lisčí Hill) above Dolní Dunajovice for his design, where a chapel dedicated to Saint Roch stood from the 17th century until the end of the 18th century. The concept refers to the object of the original chapel. Just like the fragments of our memory, fragments of the liturgical space emerge when looking at this (semi)forgotten spiritual place. Along the historical path to the summit, the author placed several limestone blocks as reminders of the chapel's furnishings: steps (an integral part of the entrance), a bench (a place of rest and prayer), an ambon (a pulpit for a hypothetical dialogue in the landscape), and a kneeler (a deepening of personal spirituality under the cross). The fifth element should be a restored cross placed on the torso of the preserved pedestal (which, due to an ongoing process for declaring it a national cultural monument, is currently represented by a temporary wooden cross). The arrangement of the furniture elements also refers to the tradition of small sacred architecture (wayside shrines, wayside crosses, chapels) along pilgrimage routes. The individual furniture elements thus guide the way for pilgrims to the cross. The project was realized in August 2016. The inauguration was associated with a blessing ceremony for the cross. Evidence that the place has begun to come alive again is the several weddings that have already taken place here.