The unique Brno district of Kamenná kolonie celebrates 101 years at Špilberk with an exhibition

Brno – The development of the former emergency colony for workers into a distinctive artistic quarter visited by tourists is mapped by the exhibition From Skala to Kamenca, which the Museum of the City of Brno opened today at Špilberk Castle. It was created to mark the 101st anniversary of the establishment of the Kamenná colony, now a unique urban development a short distance from the center of Brno. The exhibition took a year and a half to prepare, said one of the curators, Žaneta Ročková, today to ČTK.

"We were approached by neighbors from the Kamenná colony who wanted to organize an exhibition for last year's 100th anniversary of the district. However, our exhibition plan for 2025 was already full, so we scheduled it for this year instead," stated Ročková. The authors of the exhibition went through hundreds of photographs during the preparation. "We had several images in our collections, but the Archive of the City of Brno, the Technical Museum, the Moravian Museum, and the Czech Academy of Sciences significantly contributed as well," Ročková mentioned.

Dozens of photographs have been on display since this afternoon in the Gothic hall and the treasury of Špilberk Castle, where the Museum of the City of Brno is located. The entrance to the exhibition space is from the small courtyard. In addition to photographs documenting the development of the unique district, the exhibition also features items related to the workers who founded the colony in 1925 and artworks created in the community of artists since the 1970s.

The Kamenná colony was established as a settlement in an exhausted sandstone quarry on a steep slope above the Svratka River in 1925. Originally, it was inhabited by poor workers, which corresponded to the small houses built closely together. Similar colonies also emerged in other cities in the Czech Republic, but the Kamenná colony is the only one that has survived to this day.

"Most of these emergency colonies disappeared after World War II; they were demolished, dismantled, and had to give way to urban development. The advantage of Kamenca was that it was built on such a geological profile and terrain where it was impossible to build large roads or bigger development projects," noted Ročková.

Since the 1970s, artists and bohemians have been moving into the Kamenná colony, and after 1989, the district evolved into a distinctive community neighborhood. The exhibition documenting the transformation of the district will run until February next year.

On Thursday, the Museum of the City of Brno will present a new audiovisual program Noon, which saved Brno. In the Chapel of the Crosses, it will recall at 16:45 the legend according to which the city resisted the siege by Swedish troops in 1645 due to the ringing of the noon bell as early as 11:00. The exhibition that tracks the entire course of the siege can be seen at Špilberk until August 16 of this year.