Maroš Rovňák belongs among the middle-generation multimedia and interdisciplinary artists. He entered the Slovak art scene in 2002 as one of the nominees for the prestigious Oskár Čepan Award conferred to Slovak artists under the age of 35. Rovňák’s work has long been dominated by his interest in humans as fragile beings constantly striving to find their role in the Universe and justify their own existence. It is, therefore, understandable that he was drifted toward artistic research of death and the rituals related to burials and mourning in various cultural and historical contexts.
Rovňák’s art intervention in the space of the St. Michael’s funeral chapel, consisting of an ossuary, in the Old Castle is the result of his residency in Žiak House, organised by the Slovak Mining Museum in Banská Štiavnica. One line of his site-specific installation, called simply “The Port”, works with references to the medieval custom of displaying exhumed human skeletal remains in ossuaries of chapels, or directly in churches and chapels. This custom traditionally served as the Latin Memento mori, making humans remember their mortality. The other line of the installation is a reference to ancient ideas about people’s journey to the underworld. With his intervention, Rovňák poetically revives the memory of the site which is today part of the Museum’s exhibit.
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