During the Second World War, the Red Army was not able to liberate Bratislava from Nazi troops until 4 April 1945. This was late relative to other Slovak cities, and was largely attributable to Bratislava’s unorthodox location. 

On the event’s fifth anniversary, 4 April 1950, a monument honouring the "Soviet Army" as the liberators of Bratislava was unveiled in the area between Reduta, the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary (popularly known as Notre Dame), and the Carlton Hotel – today, Eugen Suchoň Square. Its authors were professor sculptor Jozef Kostka and the architect Milan Škorupa. At the centre of the grassed area stands an elevated plateau of rectangular plan (its longitudinal axis runs north-west to south-east), from the centre of which a robust pylon rises perpendicularly and is topped by an allegorical sculpture of a half-naked woman. She is portrayed in an oblique stance running across the terrain, her arms outstretched in a gesture of victory, a bouquet of flowers in her right hand, and her gaze fixed upon the unknown. The plateau and pylon are clad in red Swedish granite, and the bronze sculpture is cast in a naturalistic style. According to the memories of contemporaries, the model for the statue was a young girl from the Bratislava Castle Hill area. 

On the south-west face of the pylon – on the axis of the access path – is a dedication inscribed in bronze capital letters: 

„ TO THE LIBERATING SOVIET ARMY 

GRATEFUL BRATISLAVA “. 

As with other memorial works from the post-war period, instead of the historically more accurate name Red Army, the term Soviet Army is used, even though that entity was not officially established until 1946. 

Formally, the monument draws clear parallels with "French sculpture".

PB

Research status as of 16. 06. 2023.