“As a child, I had something encoded in me, that made me know what was wrong. When the Soviet Union attacked Budapest and there were terrible things going on, I knew that the Soviets were not right. Thanks to my father we knew what the Slovak state was like. When I think of what ideology we have adopted…..That a neighbour reported a neighbour. It still represents an inner shame for me. Since childhood I knew that the Soviet Union was murderous and that Stalin was a murderer, the family led us to a clear attitude towards the Soviet Union. Sometimes I wonder how some of our dissidents were praising the regime back in 1951 because, at that point, many people already could understand that with the Soviet Union it was not as it was supposed to be.“
“Eugen Brikcius, one of the organisers of Charter 77, came to me. By then, the situation was such, basically, when you signed it, you had to emigrate. He came to me and said, 'Sign, but you have to pack your family and you have to emigrate.' I am now content with the fact I didn’t leave. Because we lived here, it wasn’t the 1950s anymore, but we were not allowed to travel. We didn't just want to leave at once. Here we worked so much together, I think it's very good that we stayed here. Of course, we would have made a career there, but what is a career? Here we left authentic testimony and messages. We lived here and we perceived the world a little differently than the artists in the West. For example, the big shift to environmental awareness. We have responded to the environment since 1969-1970. At that time, I first got access to the materials of the Club of Rome. Last year I had a big exhibition of 50 years of the Club of Rome. Of course, the Club of Rome made mistakes. The first thing was that on April 7, 1968, people came to think about the state of the world and made prospects and predictions for the future. They were excited about what we should do differently. Unfortunately, now that I was doing the exhibition after 50 years, I talked a lot with the experts, there were amazingly many ecologists. And their materials clearly state that almost nothing has been done in those 50 years.”
“If you really want to be a politician, you have to be crazy like the artist. To want to make the best of it, work together, pass on good ideas. I realized that I could not do all this as a politician, and so I left. Of course, politicians are different and do politics for different reasons. It is necessary to start at home, in Europe, in the world. Even in 1974 I did such a project Habitats - where our house consisted of 6 continents. Because of the Rome Club, people began to look into the future, a great many top scientists and wise people began to look at where we were going. And they know it, and there was a lot of trouble with that- things need to be done differently, different technological processes, different philosophy of life. Then we could save ourselves. But when these wise people know how we could save ourselves, though I do not believe in it very much, since we have wasted many years ... Looking at the greatest threats to this planet, I see neither the world nor Europe seeking change to make it work. Even though I dig into myself, it is difficult to see the way, because there are people who will be much more difficult to change than me. But those students (Fridays for Future) who do ... When I was preparing the exhibition, even though I was on it, I realized that going out was a much bigger gesture. The way Fridays for Future students do, because they will have to be here. But they have to stiffen ... I believe this planet can be saved if we try, but not through ideology. I thank the young, their effort and courage is a celebration of the November revolution.“
Rudolf Sikora was born on April 17, 1946, in Zilina into the family of a teacher and mathematician and clerk. The Sikora family lived until Rudolf was 6 years old in Zilina. Then his father was transferred to Spišská Nová Ves, and at the end of the 1950s, the family returned to Žilina, where Rudolf graduated from secondary general school. In 1963, at the age of seventeen, he was admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava, where he attended two studios: scenography and painting. After graduation, Sikora founded the Open Studio and organized the exhibition Topography of Cycles: Koller, Sikora, Meliš, which is now considered a milestone in the art scene after August 1968. In the 1970s he was not allowed to exhibit for political reasons. Despite being offered a place at the Academie des beaux artes in Paris, he did not emigrate, because he was afraid of the impact on the study opportunities of his younger siblings, and considered it important to work on the Slovak art scene. He cooperated with activist groups, especially conservationists and ecologists. In 1988, together with other previously banned artists, he was appointed an official of the Artists’ Union within the perestroika, and in 1989 he helped save the mansion in Mariánka. He also participated in the preparations for the protest rally on November 19 in front of Comenius University. After the Revolution, he worked as an advisor to the ministers of Culture Chudík and Snopek, and taught at the Academy of Fine Arts (AVU) and the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts (FAMU) in Prague. In 1990 he left VPN to fully engage in art.
