ANDREJ ĎURKOVSKÝ

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, Visitors and Citizens of Bratislava,

City festival The Summer of Culture is celebrating its 33rd birthday. In life of every man is this age considered as a milestone, as a breakpoint. Imaginary manhood is being reached, past is being balanced and future being planed. Jaromír Nohavica in his song “Třiatřicet” (Thirty-three) sings: “Retirement is far away, youth gone, my candle shines, how long will I haunt in this world. I am thirty-three. The summer of culture has not only its history, experience and successes but also it was able to deeply engrave into people’s hearts. I am foretelling him great future and I hope that the festival will be „haunting“people for a very long time and make us happy and pleased.

Our “Little Big City” is one of the smallest capital cities in the Europe, but its ambitions in the field of culture are great and courageous. Bratislava has got great cultural potential and we want to perceive this fact very sensitively and take the utmost account of it. Ambition of the festival is to spirit the streets and offer every visitor such an attractive program, that everyone will find the right stuff.

For sure you have noticed that in the logo of this festival is colorful shining sun. I hope so will be this year’s sun in our city – shining, smiling and bright.

Let The Summer of Culture 2008 be your felicitous companion through the upcoming summer months and I hope that this magical 33rd volume will offer you magical experiences.

Andrej Ďurkovský
Lord Mayor of the Bratislava