Inspiration Forum

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 26

5:00 - 6:30 PM
Jihlava – European Capital of Culture?*
Panel discussion on the city’s prospective candidacy

September 2022 is the deadline for Czech cities to apply for the title of European Capital of Culture 2028. A number of cities have started intensive preparations for candidacy (Brno, České Budějovice, Liberec, Broumov), and others are considering it. Will Jihlava accept the challenge? What could the candidacy and the potential victory bring in terms of culture, tourism, education and the overall development of the city and the whole region? Together with the panellists, we will try to find answers to these and other questions, and identify the risks and challenges of the whole process. The guests will include political representatives of the Statutory City of Jihlava, the Vysočina Region, representatives of Pilsen, the 2015 title holder, representatives of the Slovak candidate city Hlohovec and independent experts.

Guests: Martin Baxa, Karolína Koubová, Veronika Moravčíková, Magdalena Mullerová, Vítězslav Schrek, Petr Šimon
Moderated by: Roman Černík

*Czech language only

7:30 - 9:00 PM
Celebration of Wildness*
Panel discussion on nature and religion

There is a considerable consensus that our planet is rapidly deteriorating due to the human use of fossil fuels. Europe has therefore started to discuss the Green New Deal, which many Czech politicians often called “green madness” during their election campaigns, pointing out that we will lose our jobs and comfort as a result. Let us, for a moment, ignore this uncomfortable clinch in which populism and ideology are holding the facts by their neck and see if we can be mesmerized by the seemingly unsightly suburban landscapes, with raspberries in vacant lots, club-rush wetlands and arched willows. What does religious faith have to say about our relationship to nature?

Guests: Sandra Silná, Jiří Sádlo
Moderated by: Petr Vizina

*Czech language only

GUESTS

Martin Baxa (Czech Republic)

Mayor of Pilsen and Vice-Chairman of the ODS party. He is qualified as a lecturer on history and geography for secondary schools with a diploma from Masaryk University in Brno. Until his election as a Member of Parliament, he taught geography at the grammar school on Mikulášské náměstí in Plzeň and, even during his public functions, he always kept a part-time job as a teacher. After the local elections in 2010, he was elected Mayor of Pilsen. After the 2014 elections, he held the post of 1st Deputy Mayor for Culture, Tourism, Heritage Protection and the project Pilsen – European Capital of Culture 2015. Since October 2017 he has been a Member of Parliament and since 2018 he has again been the Mayor of Pilsen.

Roman Černík (Czech Republic)

Co-author and initiator of the Pilsen 2015 project. The long-term focus of his work is on the intersections and relationships between art and education. He teaches at the University of West Bohemia and at Prague’s Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (DAMU). In 1998, he co-founded the JOHAN Centre for Cultural and Social Projects in Pilsen (a registered institute) where he works as a director. The centre runs Moving Station, an open community space for culture education and community activities. He is also consistently involved in cultural policy, and has participated in the development of cultural strategies for the cities of Pilsen, Písek, Plná and Mělník. As a producer, dramaturge and occasional performer, he has been involved in a number of theatre projects in the Czech Republic and abroad.

Karolína Koubová (Czech Republic)

Mayor of Jihlava. She graduated in Theatre Management at the Janáček Academy of Music and Performing Arts Brno (JAMU). She systematically honed her management skills in subsequent training programmes. She also gained foreign experience by studying in Finland at Mikkeli University of Applied Sciences, majoring in Business Management. Since 2009, she has dedicated herself to the DIOD theatre space, for which she prepared the production plan and which she has managed and successfully developed since its opening in 2011. Since 2014, she has been gaining political experience and she was successful with the Forum Jihlava initiative in local elections. Since 2018, she has been the Mayor of Jihlava.

Veronika Moravčíková (Czech Republic)

Artistic director of the Hlohovec2026 candidacy and a curator. She studied Cultural Studies at the Department of Cultural Studies, Faculty of Arts, Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, where she worked as an Assistant Professor until 2020. She is currently the Head of the Municipal Cultural Centre in Hlohovec and was the artistic director of the Hlohovec candidacy for the title of European Capital of Culture for 2026. She also works as a curator (Galerie na schodech in Nitra and Municipal Gallery in Hlohovec) and producer at the Nové divadlo in Nitra, which she also co-founded.

Magdalena Mullerová (Czech Republic)

She works in the Creative Europe Office at IDU and promotes the Creative Europe programme of the European Union in the Czech Republic, consults on international cultural projects and works on strategic planning of various organisations. She has initiated a series of debates and lectures on current topics for cultural professionals called Střed zájmu and a management programme focused on strategic planning of cultural organisations at the IDU Academy.

Jiří Sádlo (Czech Republic)

Biologist specialising in plant ecology. He works at the Botanical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences focusing on plant sociology, invasion ecology and Holocene landscape evolution. He is the author of the essay Krajina jako interpretovaný text (Landscape as an interpreted text, 1994), the text Prázdná země (Empty land, 2007), and co-author of the books Biologie krajiny (Biology of the landscape, 1999), Krajina a revoluce (Landscape and revolution, 2005), and Mlsné čenichání jihovýchodním směrem (Sniffing in the Southeast direction, 2014). Every now and then he contributes to journals Vesmír and Analogon.

Vítězslav Schrek (Czech Republic)

The Governor of the Vysočina Region. He comes from Znojmo in South Moravia, but he has considered the Vysočina Region his second home for many years. He studied Special Education at Charles University in Prague. Until 2003, he was engaged in a private business, and following an offer to work for social services he became a project manager and deputy director of Jihlava Regional Charity. In the years 2014 to 2019 he worked as a director of the Home for the Elderly in Velké Meziříčí. Since 2006, he has been a representative of the statutory town of Jihlava, and in 2020 he was elected Governor of the Vysočina Region.

Sandra Silná (Czech Republic)

Parish priest of the Czechoslovak Hussite Church based in Brno. She studied Hussite theology and psychosocial studies at the Hussite Theological Faculty of Charles University and Environmental Studies and Humanities at the Faculty of Social Studies of Masaryk University. She worked as a librarian, waitress and for several years as a tea shop manager. She was ordained in 2006. From 2008 to 2016 she served as Secretary General of the Ecumenical Council of Churches in the Czech Republic. She brews her own beer called Božínku! (My gosh!) and keeps bees.

​​Petr Šimon (Czech Republic)

Coordinator and programme manager of teams Pilsen 2015, Novi Sad 2022, and Tampere 2026 teams. Born in Karlovy Vary, his passion is French literature and language, and Basque culture. He is the president of the Alliance Française de Pilsen. Since 2008, he has been continuously involved in activities related to the European Capitals of Culture, where he is particularly dealing with issues of European and international relevance and cooperation. Among other city initiatives, he has worked for the ECOC Pilsen 2015, Novi Sad 2022, and Finnish candidate city Tampere. Recently, his steps have often lead to Liberec, as he is part of their candidate team for ECoC 2028. On top of that, he works at the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen being in charge of activities related to the preparation of the Equal Opportunities Plan.

Petr Vizina (Czech Republic)

Majored in theology and applied ethics at KTF UK and is currently working in media ethics. He writes and records interviews for Aktuálně.cz and Czech Radio. He was a member of the editorial offices of Lidové noviny and Hospodářské noviny and led the culture editorial board at Czech Television for seven years.

READING LIST

If you want to delve deeper into the topic, here is a selection of the most interesting texts and other resources recommended by the programme guests, which are definitely worth the read!

SALVE (only in Czech)
Petr Vizina: “For example, the inconspicuous theological journal Salve, published by the Dominicans in conjunction with Charles University in Prague. In its latest issue, Salve deals with the topic of populism. The texts, analysing the language of populism, the relationship between populism and gender, or the instrumentalization of Christianity, for instance in Viktor Orbán’s Hungary, refute the idea of theology as a discipline that is dreaming back to the deep, late medieval past, when theology used to be called the queen of the sciences.”