The Sculptor of Rocks

Liběchov has a Baroque château, now housing an exhibition of Asian cultures. One of its former owners, A. Veith, enabled the château cook Václav Levý (1820–1870) to pursue an artistic career. Levý began working in Liběchov, creating a remarkable series of sculptures in the rocks of the surrounding woods, including Blaník and Klácelka Cave. On the road towards Tupadly, Klácelka is an artificial cave with reliefs of fantastic beings—human bodies with animal heads—offering a distinctive illustration of J. W. Goethe’s Reynard the Fox, inspired by H. Grandville’s work. In the forest beside the road to Brocno is the rock-cut cave U ještěra, with indistinct reliefs of a lizard, a snake, harpists and human heads. Above Želízy, the monumental Devil’s Heads are carved from the rocks: the largest sculpture in the open countryside in this country. (See Ješovice.)