The statue at Bubny train station commemorates the transports

Prague - Today, a statue by Aleš Veselý titled The Gate of Irrevocability was unveiled at Prague's Bubny train station. The large sculpture serves as a symbolic cornerstone for the future Memorial of Silence. On the site of Jewish transports, it is to become not only a place to commemorate tragic history but also a center for discussions about the Holocaust and its legacy today. Veselý's statue takes the form of a railway track leading to the sky.
    The director of the Holocaust Memorial organization, Pavel Štingl, told journalists today that the project for the reconstruction of the station has already received a building permit. It has also received an exemption from the building moratorium that applies to the area. The organizers aim for the new memorial to open in time for the anniversary of the first Prague transports in the autumn of 2016. The designer of the station's reconstruction is Šárka Malá from the studio of Roman Koucký.
    Aleš Veselý stated today that he had been contemplating an artistic remembrance of the people who disappeared during the war for decades. "I had very personal reasons for this, as 42 of my closest relatives did not return, they perished," he said. However, for a long time, he could not find a partner for its realization. When the Memorial of Silence began to be prepared, its placement at the former station helped shape the form of Veselý's work.
    "The unveiling of Aleš Veselý's monumental object is not just the introduction of a new statue into the public space of Prague, but primarily a message to the public and politicians that the concept of transforming the Bubny station into the Memorial of Silence is ready for implementation. Now, it will just be a matter of how quickly funding can be secured for the memorial to be opened to the public," Štingl said.
    The Holocaust Memorial organization, which is preparing to open the Memorial of Silence, has signed a fifty-year lease agreement with the building's owner, Czech Railways. However, the adjacent land will continue to be used by the Railway and Transport Administration, and trains will continue to run around the memorial. The project will be funded by the Holocaust Memorial organization, with the invested money being deducted from the rent, Štingl told ČTK. It is also possible to contribute to the establishment of the Holocaust remembrance center through donations or the Friends of the Memorial of Silence Club, information is available at www.bubny.org.
    The now non-functional station building is to become a platform with a permanent exhibition, educational programs, seasonal exhibitions, and a space for gatherings, according to the organizers' vision. They believe that Prague is also one of the few European capitals that does not commemorate the victims of the Holocaust in public spaces. The name Memorial of Silence, according to the director of the DOX center, which is a partner of the project, Leoš Válka, refers to the silence of the silent majority. This silence has often paved the way for the tragedies that humanity has faced throughout history.
    The unveiling of the statue was also planned by the organizers as a reminder of the night of March 8-9, 1944, when nearly 4,000 prisoners of the so-called Theresienstadt family camp were exterminated in Auschwitz. Today’s ceremony in Bubny was attended by witnesses of World War II.