After World War II, the Czech borderlands became a 'communist Klondike' that continued in the atmosphere of emerging capitalism even after the 'Velvet Revolution'. On the other hand, areas outside the traditional centers were filled with freedom without constant oversight from above, which created a suitable environment for the emergence of the Liberec association Sial. The Faculty of Art and Architecture at the Technical University in Liberec, founded seventeen years ago by one of the active participants in Sial and later Hubáček's successor in leading the legendary studio, is also trying to build on the dynamic wave of creative freedom.
Ještěd f kleci or 'JFK – the cult award of Fatula' is a competition for the best student project at the Faculty of Art and Architecture in Liberec, with over 250 student works vying for the sixth award of Hubáček's gem trapped in Foglar's puzzle on Tuesday, June 14, 2011, ranging from small urban furniture to complex regional urbanism.
For the sixth edition of JFK, a complete jury composed of these independent experts met: tireless experimenter and black sheep of the Bratislava FA STU Mária Topolčanská, who has experience from postgraduate studies under Sol-Morales and as the curator of the Czech-Slovak exhibition at the 9th Venice Architecture Biennale, a swallow returned to a land devoted to architecture and enriching the Czech scene Marie Davidová, who studied architecture in Oslo, Norway, worked at the office of Snøhetta, Expology, served as a research assistant and teacher at the university in Trondheim, and since 2011 has been leading with Kristof Hanzlik the CollaborativeCollective, urban planner of historical cities and communities Jan Sedlák from Prague's CTU, the greenest thinking architect in the country and co-founder of SEA (Group for Ecological Architecture) Petr Suske, and the biggest promoter of collective sports among architects Roman Brychta, a graduate of ŠA AVU (probably soon also the head of the architectural studio at VŠUP) and one of the four leading figures in the studio Projektil, proving that it is possible to kickstart a professional career through architectural competitions.
The festive evening was, as usual, an excuse for an informal meeting of most teachers, past alumni, and 'distance' students. Marie Davidová pointed out in her introduction the effort to design for places that students could not visit themselves. She also missed sufficiently presenting analyses. Jan Sedlák lightened the situation by stating he came not to criticize but to award prizes. However, in the flood of creative ideas oscillating at the margins, he found a lack of standard projects that came only with banal solutions. Mária Topolčanská described the use of the inner voice in synonyms that did not sufficiently express the process through which its bearers have gone. Petr Suske was most unsettled by the generational rift dominating the jury and Roman Brychta was pleasantly surprised by the level of the freshman projects and the number of various assignments in individual studios.
Among the eight nominated projects, Adam Lacina, Mikuláš Hapka, Lukáš Koubek, Lenka Pechanová, Radka Ježková, Tamara Staňková, Andreas Dzikos and the duo Michaela Dlouhá and Andrea Tůmová eventually made it.
In some moments, JFK's history repeated itself, as the main award once again went to a first-year student Adam Lacina with his design for a tidal chapel in Storsand, Norway, following the model of the inaugural year when Tomáš Foltýn won.
After the diplomatic neglect of the Department of Environmental Design during past years, thanks to Mikuláš Hapka (unfortunately not present at this historic moment), nominations have finally reached this studio.
After a long dominance of Zdeněk Franěk, the award for the best studio this time went to the urban association around Jiří Janďourek, Jiří Klokočka, and Zdena Zedníčková, of whom Jan Sedlák positively assessed their 'engagement' and the fact that someone has finally started to fully engage with their immediate surroundings. The qualities of the studio are also affirmed by two nominations for the best project.
The sixth academic gathering before scattering into the world did not disappoint again.