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Brno celebrates the founder of genetics with a 4,6 metres high bronze sculpture
The city of Brno, led by mayor Markéta Vaňková, honored the famous Augustinian monk, mathematician, and biologist, Johann Gregor Mendel, with a new statue as a celebration of the 200th anniversary of his birth that will be on July 20.
Johann Gregor Mendel is considered as one of Brno’s most famous citizens and a founder of genetics who is famous for his experiments that involved the crossbreeding of pea plants, through which he discovered the role of dominant and recessive genes, formed the core of genetics.
He used the abbey’s 2 hectares of land to conduct hybridization experiments on plants and eventually published the results of his work in 1866.
The incredible 4,6 metres high bronze sculpture will be dedicated to him. It is being made by a team of 25 people in a Brno foundry, and the cost of the statue has been estimated at approximately EUR800,000.
Brno artist Jaromír Gargulák, statue author, says that he found inspiration by doing exactly what Mendel did while planting peas and watching them grow, which will be the main theme of the statue.
It will also be possible to walk between the pea shoots and see the work from all sides which will make the statue unique and interesting to people.
This sculpture will represent and reflect Mendel’s contribution to humanity that will be created as part of the “Sculpture for Brno” project. Several works commemorating personalities connected with Brno have already been introduced including a sculpture of writer Jan Skácel, the composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the inventor Thomas Alva Edison. In addition to Mendel, statues of architect Adolf Loos, Father Martin Středa, and Marie Restituta, a nurse executed by the Nazis in 1943, are also to be installed.
“The selected work is completely different from other sculptures in Brno. What is special is that people will be able to approach it from all sides, touch it and walk through it. We do not have anything like it in the city”, said Deputy Mayor of Brno, Petr Hladík. (photo credit: Spolecne o.p.s.)
