The fountain was created as part of the restoration and adaptation of Mirbach Palace for use by the Bratislava City Gallery, which took place from the 1960s to the 1970s. The renovation included redesign of the inner courtyard, where the design team (Peter Brtko, Virgil Droppa, Juraj Hlavica, and Ľudovít Režucha) installed a simple modern fountain. The original fountain comprised the low, circular stone basin that still stands there today. The basin housed a wide, plain cylinder with a fluted casing and a nozzle at its centre from which a gentle stream of water flowed. The cylindrical shape was deliberately chosen – symbolically, it was intended to resemble the well that once stood in the courtyard. The soft flow of water and the fluting were designed to dampen the sound of the fountain and its echo in the relatively small space of the courtyard, imbuing it with a more meditative character. 

In the 1980s, this minimalist structure was replaced by a bronze cast of the historical sculpture Triton and Nymph. The sculpture installed in place of the modern work bears the signature of the Neo-Baroque sculptor Viktor Tilgner. The fountain sculpture is one of three casts created based on an earlier design (the oldest cast is part of the fountain in Vienna’s Volksgarten, another is held in the collections of the Slovak National Gallery, and the 1981 cast is held in the collections of the Bratislava City Gallery). Although the sculpture is impressive, its striking form and material, as well as the dynamics and sound of the spraying water, have significantly altered the proportions and atmosphere of the courtyard. 

The fountain in the courtyard is open to the public free of charge during the opening hours of the gallery and Emil Café.

DZ, NB, ZD 

Research status as of 04. 06. 2025.