Students demand to preserve Klementinum for university life

Prague - Approximately twenty people came today to the Ministry of Culture to submit a petition regarding the Prague Klementinum. The signatories demand that after the potential completion of the new National Library (NK) building, Klementinum be transferred to the administration of Charles University. According to the organizers, who are mainly students, nearly a thousand people have signed the petition. In the afternoon, it was received by the head of the Ministry's information office, Daniel Hermann. The office has not yet commented on it.
    Klementinum, currently the main seat of the NK, has been closely connected with the university for over 300 years in the past. "It can be assumed that, unlike the National Library, the university will preserve the main purpose of the entire complex in the future," states the petition. Its authors belong to those who are concerned about the possible future commercialization of the Klementinum complex, which is a national cultural monument.
    After the modern library collections move to the planned new building in Letná, many spaces in Klementinum will become available. According to the authors of the petition, these could then become of interest to dealers. The library management has repeatedly rejected these views and states that cultural institutions will move into the freed spaces - the Association of Book Sellers and Publishers, the PEN Club, and NK are already negotiating with the Václav Havel Library and the Writers' Union. Moreover, NK plans to continue cooperating with the university in the future.
    Critics partially base their concerns on a previous statement by NK director Vlastimil Ježek. He supposedly wants to make Klementinum more open - besides the library function, which will remain the foundation of the building, he wants the library to be a visitor and educational space; he believes that congresses could also be held on the premises.
    Students fear that the space will lose its genius loci, cease to be a meeting place for the academic community, become a lifeless space, and turn into a tourist site. They believe that all operations will move to the new building.
    In a similar vein, several scientists, artists, university professors, and art historians spoke out in mid-January. According to them, university life should remain in the center, and it should be examined whether the historical building of Klementinum would suffice for the library.
    However, the NK aims to have a new building primarily due to spatial reasons; they considered other options, and the construction of a new structure reportedly proved to be optimal. Just as the option to keep the NK only in Klementinum has the support of thirty academics, the construction of a new NK building according to Jan Kaplický's design in Letná has the support of another 50 representatives from the scientific community.