ODVAHA (2015)

An interview with director Pavel Štingl on making the film

In the past, various distributors worked with me as director and producer to create PR materials, including various interviews for journalists and film festivals. In today's lean times for documentary distribution, I have decided to save the State Cinema Fund money by interviewing myself...

How did you come to work with Jaroslav Róna?
The Tvrdohlaví art group is my generation from school. We served in the military together, had physical education together, and went hiking and rafting together. In fact, we still go to the mountains together, organized by Václav Marhoul – the Tvrdohlaví's former producer for our entire team of "Flying Ploughs."
Once recently (which at my age means about 15 years ago) I came across Jaroslav drawing something early in the day in the dining room of the Hájenka mountain hut. Like me, he can't sleep in in the morning. He said he was working on a sculpture called Slave, a figure dragging a ball and chain... He climbed on the table to show how big the actual bronze ball would be.
And so we agreed that, after our trip, I would visit his studio at the cemetery and he would talk into the camera, and once Slave was finished we would release the interview. When I arrived with my camera at his studio in the new Jewish cemetery, he was holding an envelope with a letter announcing that he had won the commission to create the Franz Kafka Monument. And so we spent the next three years talking in front of the camera about this famous equestrian statue of his.

Equestrian statue?
Yes, that is what he sometimes calls it: Mr. "K" is riding on the shoulders of an empty suit... Besides, equestrian statues are a great ambition for sculptors who take a more traditional approach to art. That is why the statue in Brno was such a prestigious commission for Jaroslav Róna, something like his life's work..

In other words, after the first monument it was understood that you would also film his other grand works?
No, it wasn't like that. He is too productive an artist. The Cinema Fund would not have had the resources to do it, and television doesn't produce that many pieces on culture. Years ago, we shot a few scenes of Jaroslav working on his ship by the Danube. But unfortunately that was the end of it, because apparently the Danube was more enthusiastic about this elegant sculpture than the cultural scene in Bratislava, and so it had to do without cinematic fame.

You mean nobody wanted to finance a documentary about it?
Finding money for public sculptures is just as complicated as financing large-scale documentary films. I personally feel that it is the duty of investors to shoot a film about a subject like a monument for a square in a large city. Not much footage has survived of Myslbek's work on St. Wenceslas, and it has been endlessly recycled for more than a century. I believe that it should have been a given that the City of Brno would fill its city archives with footage showing the creation of a new monument dedicated to the Margrave of Moravia.
I continued to feel this way until I presented this opinion to the mayor in writing.

He wasn't interested in any footage with the working title "A Knight for Brno"?
He wrote that it was surely a good thing that I was doing, and that I should apply for one of their culture grants.

Did you apply?
No, because the nearest deadline from the time of this correspondence was after the sculpture was supposed to be unveiled.

So who ended up financing the film?
It is a co-production by K2, which also received funding from the Cinema Fund and from Czech Television.
In the beginning, when the sculpture was commissioned, the process of its realization was supposed to be filmed by Brno television. They were there once and after that weren't interested anymore. In the late stages of modeling, Jaroslav Róna asked me to shoot some footage for the archives, and said that he would help pay for the cameraman. So during the first round the sculptor himself ended up being the producer.

Does that mean that your original idea didn't even involve shooting an entire film? You only began when asked by the artist, like on commission?
It wasn't anything like that. Basically, I wasn't expecting to make a large-scale documentary, not even during those first days of filming. At the outset, for both Miroslav Janek and me it was a kind of cultural service for something unique that was being created and that wouldn't be repeated anytime soon. It soon became clear that we were watching the birth of an extraordinarily important sculpture, but I still didn't know how to approach the subject as a true documentary film – meaning more than just a chronicle or reportage about its creation.

What was the decisive factor?
Two things: I had witnessed the creation of several sculptural works, but this one is truly much bigger. Not just in height and volume. Work on this sculpture involved many remarkable approaches that recalled the birth of the world's greatest monuments. The process delved deep into art history and involved a confrontation of the present with various eras from the past. We were witnessing the birth of a statue, which is always a minor miracle. In addition, this one is modern and humorous, but also dignified and made in the same traditional manner as the old masters. We succeeded in capturing the artist's uncertainties and his search for artistic approaches that are only mobilized once every hundred years. The material began to demand a larger approach than merely providing witness.

And the other thing, besides the random chance with Brno television and with a subject that demanded its own approach...
The second to tenth other things were the basic themes that Jaroslav and I began to consciously discuss while we filmed the endless hours of modeling. Our discussions moved from knights and the dramatic details of the horse to the relationships of sculptors and architects within the modern city and a broad discussion of the importance of traditionally conceived sculptures for the contemporary world and for public space.
At some point I wrote a page of important questions that I turned to at the appropriate times. That was the future outline of the documentary. All of a sudden, this longitudinal documentary had also become a generation testimony, a reflection upon our current understanding of basic artistic, spiritual, and moral values... Bleh! That almost sounds like some universal cliché...

In this day and age, isn't it clichéd to create a figural sculpture for a public square in a historical city?
Not if the sculpture is imbued with a contemporary artistic viewpoint. If this is the case, then it opens up subjects that this era needs. We truly are missing a basic view of fundamental values and are losing respect for things that have been respected since time immemorial but that have not been discussed too much.

You mean that in the 21st century we should revive the values of knighthood, or we should bow to Jobst of Luxembourg and his moral values?
Jobst is a bit of a difficult case. Unfortunately, the City of Brno didn't realize in time that it is never a good idea to commission a statue with two meanings. The Margrave of Moravia is not an ideal model of behavior, no matter how important his status was at the time.
But courage, generosity, and a traditional respect for chivalry – those are values that we are missing today. We are also missing grand personalities and models. Actually, our current political representatives quite closely resemble the personal side of Margrave Jobst, whom historians are more likely to refer to as a schemer than someone who continued the legacy of his uncle Charles IV.

So Jobst's timeless legacy is as a political schemer and as an archaic holdover of the allegory of courage?
What is timeless is a respect for fundamental values, whether formulated by Charles IV, President Masaryk, or Václav Havel – all of whom I see as the knights of their times. Courage today means the courage to design a sculpture for a public square that will honor that place for hundreds of years.
Charles IV transformed Prague into a modern city by the will of God, laying it out according to the highest learning of the times. His will was fulfilled by the greatest artists of their era.
He chose them and he chose wisely.
Today, we hold public competitions after which everyone contests the outcome in court. Then everyone haggles about the price. Then the media gests involved and turns a Platonic virtue into tabloid folksiness. Then a new city government takes office and, as is the custom in our country, ostentatiously distances itself from the whole matter. In the end, the mayor doesn't even come to the unveiling of "his" new sculpture – the tenth largest equestrian statue in the world – and tells the media that the monument isn't his problem because he only inherited it and that his view will be shaped by public opinion.

All that is in the movie?
No, it's just what accompanied our filming. The documentary is about the creation of a sculpture and about all the things a good artist has to deal with in order to get his sculpture onto the right place – meaning Moravia Square in Brno. And after all is said and done, then the sensitive viewer will think about it as he leaves the cinema – perhaps while walking across a square that is missing a statue.

So the film will be distributed in cinemas as well?
Yes, in art-house cinemas and also in small clubs. It certainly is not a blockbuster. Let's be realistic: there aren't that many viewers who are interested in a film about the creation of a work of art. But even if this type of documentary isn't the hit of the season, it will still interest its audiences 10 years from now.

So how do the moral values represented by a sculpture called Courage reach not just the artistic elite but also the general public?
The public has above all received valuable new work of art in an important location. Brno has a new symbol and something to be proud of. I won't try to guess who will understand the message of the knight on horseback and how long it will take them; it could even take a hundred years. Fortunately, bronze is a relatively durable material. As long as the knight isn't melted down for bullets during the next war, it'll be around for a long time.
And the film will be here as a witness to its creation. As it ages, it will become a valuable archive of the artistic perspective of our generation – which might already have one foot in the grave, but there is no chance of it being turned into ammunition.

And let us not forget the role of Czech Television. Besides having provided significant support for the film, it will also broadcast it – and hopefully more than once. I am convinced that it was not a bad investment for them, because the Knight for Brno is a public topic in the true sense of the word.