A commemorative site honouring Ján Kuciak and Martina Kušnírová was unveiled in 2022 on SNP Square. It was erected in the area that became the main focus for the mass civic protests For a Decent Slovakia that were organised following the murder of the young couple, and where a memorial site had spontaneously been created in tribute to them.
The initiative to establish a permanent memorial site or monument arose from the efforts of Kristián Čekovský, then a member of the National Council of the Slovak Republic. Controversy arose over the decision not to hold an open competition for design of the monument, it instead being directly commissioned from the Faculty of Architecture at the Slovak University of Technology, where the project came under the professional supervision of M. Králik. Proposals for its design were created by students at the Faculty's Department of Design as part of their semester project. Final selection from the submitted proposals was made through an internal process that involved a small group of people.
Despite the students’ involvement, the artistic execution is notably reminiscent of works from M. Králik’s repertoire of free-form sculpture. This includes the sculpture In medias res (2013), located in the nearby Franciscan Garden, for which the artist employed similar expressive techniques. The task for the monument was artistically to depict the concept of a crack or fissure. The artist chose an evocative symbolic form and expressed the idea through a visual shorthand that comprises two separate vertical elements made of welded thin metal plates. The abstract sculpture is erected between two window axes on the façade of a historic building. It takes the form of a bas-relief set into the ground, extending seamlessly from the mounting down to pavement level, and features a quotation from Ján Kuciak: Don’t thank – remember. The upper section features multiple perforations that provide a glimpse of the interior of the sculptural form, revealing an additional layer made of patinated steel. Subdued night lighting also emanates from the interior.
NB
Research status as of 28. 02. 2024.
