100 years of the metropolis in the heart of Europe – Republic Square. A unique trip into the virtual past
In the penultimate week of September, miracles will take place at Republic Square. The briefly erected “expo” will offer interested parties and passers-by an unusual experience – conveying the atmosphere of the First Republic. “Specifically, the turn of the 20s and 30s of the last century,” explained Lukáš Nádvorník, director of the Media Park agency, which realizes the unique event, for Blesk.
Against the flow of time
The visitor has only one option to walk through the places where today’s much-congested and much-cursed north-south highway leads. Specifically, it is about the section between the main station and the old building of the National Museum. You wouldn’t believe how much this location has changed since the time of the first republic due to the lively construction of the highway and subway in the 60s and 70s of the last century!
Instead of unattractive asphalt, you will walk on cobblestones, which is lined on one side by the rows of trees and greenery of the (then) newly established park – Vrchlický sadů. In the places where today he will pass during the hour on thousands of cars, tram tracks run, along which the trams ran from Wenceslas Square to the intersection U Bulhara. The space in front of Woodrow Wilson Station is not reserved for buses or cars as a parking lot, but for promenade in the greenery of multicolored flower beds. However, the opposite side of the road has seen the biggest changes you could hope for.
Where they are today gaps, whether the main road connects in a single road behind the State Opera building, you can see a built-up block of architecturally artfully designed houses. These were buildings that, due to the construction of the main road, were washed away by time and heavy demolition technique. Today, the houses no longer exist, they are designed down to the smallest detail. “Zdeněk Lukeš helped architecture a lot in this regard,” explained historian Nádvorník.
“OF welcoming and generous streets ina kind of highway in Prague disappeared, which at the same time became a significant barrier, separating the neighborhoods of Nové Město and Vinohrady. The Vrchlické sady park, once referred to as the most beautiful in Prague. All these modifications have fundamentally damaged the character of the street and have become indisputable one of the most arrogant examples of inappropriate interventions in the structure of the historic city,” Lukeš evaluates the transformation of the Sadová class in the current Wilson class. The face of the city on the border of Vinohrady and Nové Město was transformed not only by the highway, but also by the construction of the metro line C.
Don’t you know it? No wonder – this corner of Prague, although you would find it on maps, doesn’t exist in reality anymore. It was transformed beyond recognition by the construction of the north-south highway and the construction of subway C. You can walk through places that looked like this 100 years ago, but thanks to the implemented virtual reality.
Author: Media Park
Until now, it was hard to imagine how pleasant the city boulevard was in the past, let alone the Vrchlické Gardens, which was also decorated with a lake. That is why the organizers chose this location, especially on the initiative of Zdenek Lukeš. “They were considered National class or Na Příkopě streetbut not one of them has changed beyond recognition as much as Wilson’s,” said Nádvorník about why they took Wilson in particular.
Reconstruction of the past with the technology of the future
“Within virtual reality, we proceeded according to old map to find out what was here 100 years ago, what the location looked like,” explains the director of the Media Park. “It is specifically about three objects, for the main graphic form we thoroughly searched in archive materials for what they looked like. That was how this Sisyphean puzzle came together. It was literally about ant workbecause there weren’t many sources available, and not every one revealed the angle we needed.’
Complex in this respect was the “reconstruction” of the Vrchlické orchards, for which only piecemeal pictorial materials have been preserved – moreover, in black and white. “However, we wanted to get as close as possible to historical reality. That’s why we are they were based on the staffing plan, to find out which plants grew where. Then we had trees and greenery planted virtually, and to artificially make them grow old or grow highlights the work of Slovakian Wow Studio Bratislava and Key Promotion Prague.
“We worked with large amount of data and polygons, which needed to be graphically modified so that it could be viable virtually and one day also in online form. It was also difficult to scan existing buildings, that is the railway station, the State Opera House, the former main stock exchange, which was surrounded by the former building of the Federal Assembly, AND National Museum We scanned them with a drone 3d scan and then implemented them in virtual reality in order to preserve all of them details, including original decorations,” explained Juraj Krč, director of Wow Studio Bratislava.
Everything together creates a compact whole of about 400 meters, which is complemented by period noises, so you feel as if you were really in that ancient past. On the sides of the classroom corroding pedestrianswho pass the stalls, old vehicles drive by on the road on the old pavement, behind the fence you can hear the rustling of pairs of sales stalls arriving or leaving, trams speed past the boarding islands, which are looked down on from above old public lighting lamps. “Everything is authentic as it was 100 years agoKrč is proud of his work and that of his colleagues. “Only we drew pedestrians from our own anonymous databasealthough we have the means and abilities to install real personalities there as well.”
How does it work?
Visitors have two options to look into the past. Either in the form of special virtual glasses at the counters that allow an authentic experience, including a “walk” meter by meter. Walk there will be beer only virtual, so you can save your legs from walking by clicking a special controller. “It’s for safety reasons, as it would require a lot more space, and there would also be a risk that people wearing glasses could bump into each other blindly.”
“For those who may feel nauseous in glasses, the expo on náměstí Republiky will have a panoramic screen, approximately 12 meters long and 3 meters high, on which black and white scenes from the visualization will be projected,” explained Nádvorník, who planned the project three quarters of the year on the occasion of the presidency of the Czech Republic in the European Union. Together they worked on it about 20 people, and was sponsored by institutions such as the Prague Municipality, the National Film Archive, the Institute of Development Planning, Hl. m of Prague, the Museum of the City of Prague or the National Agricultural Museum.
The attraction is primarily based on virtual reality. In addition to being an impeccable attraction, this is a great teaching aid about what it looked like in Prague 100 years ago.
Author: David Zima
The third trip to the past
“We would like to mediate the project to as many people as possible. For those who do not have time to visit the expo, we are planning a project process also for the internet interface,” revealed Nádvorník, according to whom it is not only a great attraction, but also a useful teaching aid.
It already has two previous unique projects behind it, which could be visited in 2018 and 2019 – that is, before the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. It was about projects experience it again which was a project of a “travelling first republic” town that was supposed to convey the atmosphere of the first days of the independent Czechoslovak Republic, and a multimedia project Totalitywhich, as part of the anniversary of 30 years since the Velvet Revolution, approximated 40 years of red unfreedom in the form of 3D projection and video mapping.
Did you know that…
… stood between the main station and the State Opera a block of large and ornate houses featuring the leading artists of their time? One of them was designed by a well-known architect Antonin Wiehl, which, among other things, was co-created by Vyšehrad’s Slavín. The frescoes on the facade were painted by a painter Josef Schikaneder. Next to it stood the lucrative Wilson Hotel, which you can see in detail only at the expo.
where: Republic square.
When: It takes place until Saturday from 9 to 19, only on Tuesday from 14 to 19. Mornings will be preferentially reserved for schools.
Admission: Loosely.
A unique expo was created on náměstí Republiky, where you can use special glasses to go into virtual reality, to walk through Wilsonová street at a time when there was no highway. David Winter
Don’t you know it? No wonder – this corner of Prague, although you would find it on maps, doesn’t exist in reality anymore. It was transformed beyond recognition by the construction of the north-south highway and the construction of subway C. You can walk through places that looked like this 100 years ago, but thanks to the implemented virtual reality.
Author: Media Park