David Černý - The Story of the Marian Column - interview with the sculptor Petr Váňa

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Petr Váňa is an academic sculptor who returned the Marian Column to the Old Town Square in Prague. After more than 100 years. He and his closest collaborators spent 23 long years with this work and destiny. For most of that time, it seemed that the column would not return to the square. Time and politics did not favor it, often there was no money. And yet he's back. It stands in the same place as its original model from 1650 by the brilliant Baroque sculptor Jan Jiří Bendl. At the top of the column is a Corinthian capital that unfolds under the calm power of a statue of the Virgin Mary. The shadow of the column, which was built as a thank you for saving the Old Town from the advancing Swedish army, then for centuries measured the time of the people of Prague by falling on the Prague meridian every noon.
Where did Petr Váňa get the strength to work for 23 years on something that seemed like it would never see the light of day? How did he get along with the sculptor Bendle over the centuries? How did he recognize the physical appearance and character of his predecessor, who created in Prague more than 300 years ago, through the blows of the chisel? Why did the masons bring the stone for the pillar all the way from far away India? And what did Petr Váňa experience when cutting the face of the Virgin Mary? God left Peter Vana in this wonderful story for a long time. But he didn't leave him alone. Read a story that has meaning, beauty, gradation.