Architecture of Tatra Banka and Phenomenon of Tradition

Abstract

The bank building features a distinctive building type in the history of architecture. Its particularities were still little explored in Slovakia before and after 1918, i.e. in the context of diversity of the institutional spectrum of the Austrian-Hungarian monetary sector and under conditions of Slovak finance in the newly established Czechoslovakia. A lot of them can be illustrated on the example of Tatra banka’s architecture. Since its inception, it has had an exceptional position among Slovak banks. Its name became a national symbol and the bank was to serve as a showcase of Slovak banking. Since the beginning it was intended as a central nationwide Slovak bank to support Slovak industry and entrepreneurial activity and to help set up, organize and educate smaller banks all over Slovakia. Despite the fact that, in comparison with the original plan, the Tatra’s operating was considerably curtailed due to counteraction of the state power in the Hungarian part of the monarchy, its connection with the national emancipatory efforts was deeply embedded in public awareness. In the long run, the bank has maintained a leading position among Slovak financial institutions, it has carried business in industry, cooperated with Czech banks, systematically built an extensive network of branches and as the first Slovak bank penetrated into eastern Slovakia, which was under strong Hungarian influence. After establishment of the new state of the Czechs and Slovaks Tatra belonged still among the strongest banks in Slovakia, but in the context of the national economy it belonged only among medium-sized institutions. The term Tatra was, at that time, an important marketing sign and the national character of the bank was a part of it. The presented work is the result of systematic research of that building type. It presents on selected examples how the aforementioned circumstances were reflected in the architecture of the flagship of Slovak banking under the conditions of two different state establishments. The intersection interprets the style preferences, typological particularities and the link to the traditional concept of a bank building from the historic building of the first headquarters in Martin (1912), the eclectic building of the branch office in Bytca (1920 – 1921) and Liptovský Mikuláš (1925), through the new office in Bratislava (1925) in the spirit of official monumentality to the functionalist regional appearance of the modern branch of Modrý Kameň (1930 - 1932) in the style of regional modernism. The lack of a central European context is documented by comparisons with selected bank buildings at the centres of architectural events in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Czechoslovakia. At the same time, the demand is demonstrated for the connection of representative architectural forms with the pragmatism of the layout solution in the sense of building an institutional (corporate) Tatra brand.