The Cultural House in Rimavská Sobota was built together with the post office building and the Slovan Hotel as part of the civic amenities for a town that was expanding mainly towards the southwest after the war. Construction of the cultural house began as early as 1973; however, despite the involvement of local residents during the “Action Z” campaign, it took 13 years to complete due to financial constraints.
The building is conceived as an elegant two-storey volume with an atrium at its center. Its horizontality is emphasized by continuous ribbon glazing that runs along the entire perimeter of the structure. The fly tower of the theatre hall rises above the compact mass. The true compositional accent, however, is the curved volume of the staircase intended for performers. The layout is divided into two main sections – a theatre section with its facilities and an educational and cultural section with club spaces. Each part has its own separate entrance. In addition to a variety and theatre hall with a capacity of 500 visitors, the building originally included a meeting room, a puppet theatre, clubrooms for children and adults, a library with a reading room, three snack bars, and two cloakrooms for visitors.
A strong architectural feature is the internal atrium, which brings natural light into the layout. Architect Juraj Nemčok and sculptor Jozef Horvát created a circular fountain with a sculptural group at its center. The dominant artwork in the interior is a 12-metre-long enamel-on-glass mosaic titled “Women in the Field” by painter Milan Laluha. Wooden intarsia near the theatre hall were created by Dušan Zapletal, while sculptor Erna Masarovičová designed a metal wall relief in the shape of a tree.
The building was originally clad in high-quality limestone mounted on aluminium profiles of the FEAL system. However, the stone cladding was removed during later thermal insulation works.
author of the description: Monika Bočková
Bibliography:
FISCHER, J.: Budeme klásť dôraz na kvalitu. Projekt 1976, roč. 18, č. 3, s. 2-4.
https://vobraze.sk/kultura/dom-kultury-rimavska-sobota-mali-stavat-styri-roky-napokon-z-toho-bolo-trinast/
