The Imagined City: The Public Sculpture of Franc Berneker

The Banka Slovenije building on what is now Ljubljana’s central street, Slovenska cesta, is one of the finest examples of early 20th century architecture, without which it would be hard to imagine the appearance of the city’s main street. The building was designed by Czech architect František Krásný, while individual sections were executed by local master builders. Thus, the commission for the mighty atlantes on the main façade, who are holding up the first floor of the building, was awarded to sculptor Franc Berneker (1874–1932). Berneker lived and pursued his creative career in a momentous period of Slovenian history, during the awakening of national consciousness, the period of Slovenian modernism and contemporaneously with the impressionist painters, with whom he was associated in the Sava art club. He has gone down in the history of Slovenian art as a pioneer of the nation’s modernist sculpture. Yet due to the hardships of his living circumstances and his unenviable financial conditions, few of his works are realised today.

The exhibition The Imagined City brings to the fore Berneker’s public sculpture work in Ljubljana, presenting both the few examples of executed sculptures and reliefs – including the atlantes on the façade of the Banka Slovenije building, which stand out as his most monumental work – and those works that existed only as ideas. On this occasion, Banka Slovenije’s Mala Galerija is collaborating for the second year with The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška (KGLU), whose exhibition Franc Berneker: The Petrified Dream (December 2024–March 2025) was also the basis for the present exhibition at Mala Galerija. Moreover, the creation of the atlantes on the bank’s exterior is outlined for the first time in the exhibition through correspondence between the artist and the client, which also provides a background to the artist's financial hardships and illustrates the frequent delays in the realisation of commissions.

The exhibition shows only some of the designs of the monuments that Berneker planned but, for various reasons, never realised. On the main wall of the gallery, five drafts for monuments created between 1908 and 1918 are presented: Maquette for a monument to Adamič and Lunder, maquette for a Kette monument, maquette for a monument to Krek, maquette for a monument and maquette for a gravestone (“Metalworker”). There is also a special emphasis on the statue of France Prešeren, which was the subject of much debate at the time of its creation. Berneker received an honourable mention for his proposal, but the commission for the statue, which we can see today in Prešeren Square, was awarded to sculptor Ivan Zajec. Although Berneker's design has not been preserved even in a photograph, we are attempting to bring it back to life with the help of literary sources and artificial intelligence. The exhibition is thus dedicated to those works of Franc Berneker's that were never realised, in order to show an imagined city as it might appear today.

Production: Banka Slovenije
Co-production: The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška (KGLU)
Exhibition design: Špela Goltes
MGBS curator: Hana Čeferin

For the loan of works we thank The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška (KGLU) and the Museum and Galleries of Ljubljana.

For the use of archive material we thank the National Gallery, the Digital Library of Slovenia - dLib.si, the Ljubljana Historical Archive, Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage (Ljubljana Regional Unit, photo library), the Museum of Contemporary History and Zmago Tančič.