“Some officials from Vítkov would show up at the sawmill. They would ask for the keys to the safe and they would lock up Mr Deml, who had the biggest share, owning half of the enterprise. Both uncle Karel and my father had a quarter of it. They said that Mr Deml would give himself up to protect his associates who had children. I don´t know what really had happened, but he was a wonderful man. He would spend five years in Jáchymov. When he came back, he had no teeth, he looked like an old man. Though he was still quite a young man, he could be forty-five or maybe fifty years old.”
“The Russians would come to the castle and they would start to make a mess of it. They would throw furniture and other things from the front side which today no longer exists. After that, three women would pass our gate, carrying a huge Persian carpet. And it was too heavy for one of them. Later, they would probably cut it so it would fit into these little cottages of theirs. And they would say: 'Come on, Milka, go get some! Russkies are throwing things out of the windows.' And my mother would lament and say:' For God´s sake, people, we would have to give it back!' She had no idea that after that, something more would happen.”
“A map would show up regularly on our cupboard during the Reich. Since then, I just love maps. I knew exactly how the armies would advance from Stalingrad. Maybe I shouldn´t have known that as a child, but most of the times I would just happen to be there. Every time, they would unroll a huge map on the cupboard, they would weight it down by something, and standing over it, they would show how the battle lines were advancing. And my father would be bragging about him knowing all the rivers of Siberia.”
Eva Václavková was born on July 4th of 1935 in Spálov near the city of Odra in Moravské Sudety (Moravian Sudetenland). After the Munich agreement, the area become part of Nazi Germany. Eva Václavková witnessed the liberation of Spálov by the Red Army. Her father was a co-owner of a steam sawmill where more than thirty people had been employed. After the February 1948, the sawmill had been nationalised by the Communists regime. After that, her father had been working as a driver. Eva showed talent for both visual arts and music. She graduated in Russian language and Visual Arts at the Faculty of Eduaction in Brno. During the last year of study in Brno, she was admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts in Praha to study painting. During her studies, she transferred to DAMU to study stage design. From 1961 to 1972, she was a stage designer at the Slezské Theatre in Opava. In 1971, she had been attacked by an unknown assailant and suffered a cranial trauma with lifelong consequences. After leaving the theatre, she has been making her living by creating visual art. She has been living in Opava. Eva passed away on 26 May 2023.
