Prague Conservatory

The Rudolfinum is a building in Prague, Czech Republic. It is designed in the neo-renaissance style and is situated on Jan Palach Square on the bank of the river Vltava. Since its opening in 1885, it has been associated with music and art. Currently, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and Galerie Rudolfinum are based in the building. Its largest music auditorium, Dvořák Hall, is one of the main venues of the Prague Spring International Music Festival and is noted for its excellent acoustics.

The Prague Spring International Music Festival (Czech: Mezinárodní hudební festival Pražské jaro, commonly Czech: Pražské jaro, Prague Spring) is a permanent showcase for outstanding performing artists, symphony orchestras and chamber music ensembles of the world. The first festival was held under the patronage of Czechoslovak president Edvard Beneš, and its organizing committee was made up of important figures in Czech musical life. In that year, 1946, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra was celebrating its fiftieth anniversary and was therefore given the highest accolade: to appear in all the orchestral concerts. The project was initiated by Rafael Kubelík, chief conductor of the orchestra at the time. Such musicians as Karel Ančerl, Leonard Bernstein, Sir Adrian Boult, Rudolf Firkušný, Jaroslav Krombholc, Rafael Kubelík, Moura Lympany, Yevgeny Mravinsky, Charles Münch, Ginette Neveu, Jarmila Novotná, Lev Oborin, David Oistrakh, Ken-Ichiro Kobayashi and Jan Panenka have won enthusiastic ovations on the Prague Spring Festival stage. Since 1952, the festival has opened on 12 May — the anniversary of the death of Bedřich Smetana — with his cycle of symphonic poems Má vlast (My Country), and it used to close (until 2003) with Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 9.The festival commemorates important musical anniversaries by including works by the composers concerned on its programmes, and presents Czech as well as world premieres of compositions by contemporary authors. Artists and orchestras of the highest quality are invited to perform here. Some of those who have appeared at the festival include Sviatoslav Richter, Lorin Maazel, Herbert von Karajan, Mstislav Rostropovich, Julian Lloyd Webber, Boris Pergamenschikow, Lucia Popp, Kim Borg, Sir Colin Davis, Maurice André, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Leonid Kogan, Paul Klecki, Gustav Leonhardt, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Giovanni Bellucci, Alfred Brendel, Heinrich Schiff, Leopold Stokowski, Arthur Honegger, Arthur Rubinstein and Gennady Rozhdestvensky. Prague Spring's traditional venue is the Rudolfinum concert hall, a venerable neo-renaissance building with an excellent auditorium, situated on the bank of the Vltava River. It is complemented by Prague's ornate Municipal House (Obecní dům), which has a larger seating capacity.The Prague Spring has a particular focus on supporting younger performers. The Prague Spring International Music Competition was established just one year after the festival itself and is held each year in various instrumental sections. The list of past winners of competition includes Mstislav Rostropovich, Saša Večtomov, Natalia Gutman, James Galway and Maurice Bourgue.

Founded in 1885, the Prague Museum of Decorative Arts (Czech: Uměleckoprůmyslové muzeum v Praze or UPM) is housed in a Neo-Renaissance edifice built from 1897 to 1899 after the designs of architect Josef Schulz. It opened in 1900 with exhibitions on the first floor. The Museum's rich collections include decorative and applied arts and design work ranging from Late Antiquity to the present day with focus on European objects, particularly arts and crafts created in the Bohemian lands. The impressive interior of the permanent exhibition, “Stories of Materials,” offers visitors an excursion into the history and development of decorative arts in the disciplines of glass, ceramics, graphic art, design, metal, wood and other materials, as well as objects such as jewellery, clocks and watches, textiles, fashion, toys and furniture.

The Jewish Ceremonial Hall (Obřadní síň in Czech) can be found in the Josefov or Jewish Quarter of Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic. It was built in 1911-12 under the direction of architect J. Gerstl for the Jewish Burial Society (Hevrah Kaddishah) and is in the neo-Romanesque style. Originally used as a ceremonial hall and mortuary it now forms part of The Jewish Museum of Prague holding exhibitions relating to Jewish history.

The Ceremonial hall of the Prague Jewish Burial Society does not serve its original purpose – the last service to the deceased members of the Prague Jewish Community – anymore. It is used as an exhibition space administered by the Jewish Museum in Prague. The building is an excellent example of Romanesque Revival Style.

On 21 December 2023, fourteen people were killed in a mass shooting by a postgraduate history student at the main Faculty of Arts building of Charles University in central Prague, Czech Republic. Another 25 were injured, three of them foreigners. The 24-year-old perpetrator killed himself. Before the attack, his father was found dead at his home in Hostouň. At the time of the shooting, the perpetrator was one in a pool of about 4,000 suspects in a double murder case that took place six days earlier, 25 kilometres (16 mi) away, in the Klánovice Forest. The lead investigator confirmed that the police had not yet reviewed the perpetrator's potential as a suspect in the earlier killings when the Prague shootings took place, but evidence found in the latter event did link the two incidents. The attack was the deadliest mass murder in the Czech Republic since its independence in 1993, surpassing the 2020 Bohumín arson attack. It was one of the deadliest mass shootings in Europe since the 2015 Bataclan theatre massacre in Paris.

The Klausen Synagogue (Yiddish: קלויז שול, kloyz shul) is nowadays the largest synagogue in the former Prague Jewish ghetto and the sole example of an early Baroque synagogue in the ghetto. Today the synagogue is administered by the Jewish Museum in Prague.

The Old Jewish Cemetery is a Jewish cemetery in Prague, Czech Republic, which is one of the largest of its kind in Europe and one of the most important Jewish historical monuments in Prague. It served its purpose from the first half of 15th century until 1786. Renowned personalities of the local Jewish community were buried here; among them rabbi Jehuda Liva ben Becalel – Maharal (ca. 1526–1609), businessman Mordecai Meisel (1528–1601), historian David Gans (ca. 1541–1613) and rabbi David Oppenheim (1664–1736). Today the cemetery is administered by the Jewish Museum in Prague. The cemetery is mentioned in Umberto Eco's The Prague Cemetery, the novel which was named after it.

The Faculty of Law of Charles University (Czech: Právnická fakulta Univerzity Karlovy) is one of the original four faculties of Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. Founded in 1348 by Charles IV on the basis of a bull of Pope Clement VI, it is the oldest law school in the Czech Republic and Central Europe.

The Pinkas Synagogue (Czech: Pinkasova synagoga) is the second oldest surviving synagogue in Prague. Its origins are connected with the Horowitz family, a renowned Jewish family in Prague. Today, the synagogue is administered by the Jewish Museum in Prague and commemorates about 78,000 Czech Jewish victims of the Shoah.

The Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague (AAAD, Czech: Vysoká škola uměleckoprůmyslová v Praze, abbreviated VŠUP, also known as UMPRUM) is a public university located in Prague, Czech Republic. The university offers the study disciplines of painting, illustration and graphics, fashion design, product design, graphic design, ceramics and porcelain, photography and architecture.

The Golden Prague Hotel managed by Fairmont is a 9-story, 372-room hotel on the bank of the Vltava River, near the Old Town, in Prague, Czech Republic. It is managed by the Fairmont Hotels. The hotel opened in 1974 as the Inter-Continental Praha, and was later slightly renamed as the InterContinental Prague. It was designed by noted Czech architect Karel Filsak in the Brutalist style, and was constructed by the Czech national travel firm ČEDOK from 1968 to 1974. The hotel was owned by bank funds from 1990 to 1999, during the privatization process. It was renovated in 1992–1995, overseen by architect Roman Koucký. Strategic Hotels & Resorts purchased the property in 1999. The interior was renovated in 2002, though certain original elements by designer Miloslav Hejný were preserved. Westmont Hospitality Group purchased the hotel in 2010. They sold it in 2013 to the Slovak-based Best Hotel Properties, owned by investment firm J&T. It was sold again, in December 2018, to R2G, the investment group of Czech billionaire Oldřich Šlemr. The hotel was renamed the Golden Prague Hotel managed by Fairmont in May 2020, before closing for a major renovation. It will reopen in 2023 as the Fairmont Golden Prague.