The technical museum exhibition was complemented by a fountain from Expo 58

Prague - The National Technical Museum (NTM), which is undergoing a demanding multi-year reconstruction, has received a new exhibit. An interior fountain, which was created for the World Expo Expo 58 in Brussels, where it also received one of the awards, has been installed in the foyer of the third floor. After many decades, it has been restored.
Expo 58, where the then Czechoslovakia celebrated great success with its pavilion, was recalled last year by the large exhibition "The Brussels Dream." Following the success in Prague, where it was viewed by over 30,000 people, and in Brno with 3,500 visitors, its authors also prepared a Slovak version. This will begin at the Slovak National Gallery on September 24, and compared to the original version, it will highlight more the work of Slovak creators, one of the exhibition's authors, Daniela Kramerová, told ČTK today.
The interior fountain was created for the glass exhibition in the Czechoslovak pavilion, which received dozens of awards, including the grand prize, among significant global competition. The fountain itself was also awarded a certificate of honor. The design was developed by architect Adolf Benš with his assistant Jaroslav Kadlec and painter Dana Hlobilová. The oval basin was created with a new technology using polymer resins and was covered with a glass mosaic. The stand in the basin held hand-blown and shaped glass bowls, from which water cascaded down from above.
According to Jana Paulyová from NTM, the fountain was not only a bold artistic composition of its time but also one of the first implementations of an artwork in a public space. However, the fountain faced the fate of many similar exhibits. In 1959, it was still installed at the exhibition of Czechoslovak glass in Moscow, after which it disappeared without a trace. It was discovered in 1964 in Bratislava and placed in a park near the gallery in Nitra.
The glass bowls had to be taken down for the winter, and the sculpture withstood adverse weather conditions until the mid-90s. By then, it was in a state of disrepair, and the gallery offered it to the author, who had the remains of the fountain transported to Prague.
In 2005, Hlobilová donated the fountain to the NTM collections, with the only condition being that the museum would restore it to its original condition and find a place for it. The architect of the architecture and construction exhibition, David Vávra, proposed to install it in the respiratory area of the museum's third floor.
The fountain waited three years in storage for restoration until last spring, when the museum received 900,000 crowns from the Integrated Protection System (ISO) program. Experts restored the mosaic covering, which was transferred to a new basin made according to the original plan. The new glass bowls were made by the same glass factory that made the originals.
According to experts, the fountain is an example of refined artistic sensitivity from the late 1950s; its installation in the functionalist interior of the museum is evidence that objects of various styles can coexist in mutual harmony.