On Thursday the 23rd of September 2021, the Director of the Archives of Vojvodina Dr. Nebojša Kuzmanović and Assistant Director Kristijan Obšust attended a ceremony of revealing a memorial bust dedicated to the Slovak poet Adolf Svatopluk Osvald in Sremska Rača.
The bust of Adolf Svatopluk Osvald was erected in the school courtyard of the Primary School in Sremska Rača, marking the 145th year since the death of the poet who was important both for Slovak literature and culture, and for the Serbian people and the Republic of Serbia. A. S. Osvald took part in the liberation wars, that the Serbs were waging against the Turks, as a volunteer, whereby he died as a member of the volunteer corps in the Serbian Drina Division on the 4th of July 1876 at the Sremska Rača battle.
The bust was officially revealed, along with a rich cultural-arts program, by the State Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Serbia Nemanja Starović and the Ambassador of the Slovak Republic in Serbia, H.E. Fedor Rosocha.
The revealing of the memorial was, among others, also attended by representatives of the City of Sremska Mitrovica headed by Svetlana Milovanović, delegates from the Embassy of the Slovak Republic in Belgrade, representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Serbia, members of the Committee for the Erection of Monuments, representatives of the Center for Serbian-Slovak Themes, the President of Matica Slovenska in the Republic of Serbia, the Bishop of the Slovak Evangelical Church in the Republic of Serbia, the President of the Association of the Serbs in the Republic of Slovakia, numerous representatives of cultural institutions, distinguished individuals as well as citizens of Sremska Rača that gathered.
Adolf Svatopluk Osvald was born on the 12th of May 1839 in Banska Bystrica. He finished his primary and secondary education in Banska Bystrica, and from 1863 to 1866 he studied philosophy at the University in Prague. In 1862, he started working as a clerk for the court in Banska Bystrica, and later he became an editor for newspapers in Prague, Budapest and Slovakia. He translated texts from German, Polish and Hungarian languages. He wrote under the pseudonyms: A.Sv. Bistricki, Đetvan, A.S. Pohronski, Turanski, Turski, Urpinov, Urpinski.
The bust of Adolf Svatopluk Osvald was erected at the behest of the Center for Serbian-Slovak Themes from Novi Sad, members of the Committee for the Erection of Monuments as well as the personal initiative of the Director of the Archives of Vojvodina Dr. Nebojša Kuzmanović.
