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Art Nouveau – a Hungarian Perspective, Art Nouveau Museum, Clément Massier, Emil Vidor, Jugendstil, Lajos Mack, Magyar Szecesszió Háza, Museum of Applied Arts, Oszkár Tarján, Villa György Ráth, Zsolnay
Last week, I made a short trip to Budapest. And I had not one, but two Art Nouveau museums on my ‘to do list’. Of course there is a lot more to do in Budapest, but I was on my way to Szeged in the South of Hungary, and the hours I had in Budapest did not allow for more. I will have to go back to see the rest of the city some other time…
Two Art Nouveau Museums in Budapest!?!
Yes, there are indeed two Art Nouveau museums in Budapest. The first one is called The House of Hungarian Art Nouveau, or the Magyar Szecesszió Háza. The museum is housed in a building that was designed by architect Emil Vidor (27 March 1867 – 8 July 1952) in 1903, for the Bedő family. The website of the museum is very informative, and I had been looking forward to visit this museum for quite a long time.
The entrance ticket (2000 HUF) gave access to all 3 floors of the museum. So I left my bag with the lady at the front desk and at her advice headed down to the basement to start my tour. There was no one else in the basement. And for a moment I wasn’t sure I had understood her correctly. Was I actually allowed to roam the basement? It looked rather like a storage facility than a museum… The place was literally jam-packed with furniture.
I was completely puzzled. Did I end up in the museum’s storage? As there was no-one to ask, I decided to continue and take it as it was. I took some pictures of the objects I liked and then continued upstairs. Only to find out the ground floor and the first floor were almost as packed as the basement. And it disturbed me tremendously that there was nó information at all. No names of artists, no year of creation, no country of origin… nothing.
As informative and ordered the website had been, so un-informative and un-ordered was the actual museum. I had been looking forward to visit this museum for a few years. But honestly, when I walked around in it, I was in a bit of a shock. It reminded me of auction-viewings where everything is positioned in a random order. Where exceptional pieces are surrounded by things no one will ever buy as they are way beyond repair…. This appeared to be nothing other than the result of someone’s compulsive hoarding. It was almost impossible to take pictures of individual items.
Don’t take me wrong. I love Art Nouveau. And I saw some exquisite objects. But this ‘exhibit’ did not do them any justice. They were crammed between objects that were heavily damaged, broken, cracked, chipped etc. And again, there was no information at all. If this were my museum, well… let me put it this way: less is more.
Address: Magyar Szecesszió Háza, Honvéd u. 3, 1054 Budapest, Hungary
Villa György Ráth
Budapest has a monumental Museum of Applied Arts. And normally I would have gone there to see Hungarian Art Nouveau. But the thing is, the Museum of Applied Arts is closed for at least five years due to extensive restoration works. Fortunately though, their Art Nouveau collection has been relocated to form a permanent exhibition titled Art Nouveau – a Hungarian Perspective at Villa György Ráth. The villa opened its doors this September (2018), so the exhibit is fairly new.
The Dining Room
The entrance fee was the same (2000 HUF) as at the Magyar Szecesszió Háza. But this time I received a comprehensive catalogue of the collection. The lady at the front desk told me that I could give back the catalogue after my visit. Or buy it for 1000 HUF.
The French Room
The Art Nouveau interiors of Villa Ráth provide an authentic environment for the exhibition. The former picture gallery and the reconstruction of the historic dining room remind us of the original owner of the villa, the first director of the Museum of Applied Arts and bourgeois art collector, György Ráth (1828–1905).
Three distinctive schools of Art Nouveau, the British, the Austrian and the French, are presented in separate interiors. The Art Nouveau dining room and sitting room allow the visitors a glimpse of Hungarian homes at the turn of the century. In the display cases Zsolnay ceramics, glass works by Tiffany and Gallé, and jewellery by Lalique and his contemporaries can be admired. Bugatti’s exclusive pieces of furniture reveal the influence of Oriental art whereas the inspiring role of the Transylvanian roots and of the national past can be seen in the gallery with Hungarian art of the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
A completely different approach than at the previous museum. And definitely one that I prefer. I like to know what I am looking at. The exhibition was well curated and included some excellent pieces. And just so you can get a good impression, I have photographed the objects I personally liked the most. If you hover over the pictures with your mouse, you can read the information I copied from the catalogue.
Address: Villa György Ráth, Városligeti fasor 12, 1068 Budapest, Hungary
If you have ever visited either one of these museums, will you let me know how you experienced it. Did you also feel that need to know what you were looking at?
Read more:
Artistic era came, went, returned (The Budapest Times)
Digitised Collection of the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts
The House of Hungarian Art Nouveau – The Magyar Szecesszió Háza
Villa György Ráth: Art Nouveau, the Hungarian Perspective
Budapest Museum of Applied Arts – Wikipedia
About Art Nouveau 
Sadly, I think you missed the Villa Schiffer (now known as the Museum of Customs and Tax History) when you were in Budapest. It is gorgeous. A bit out of the way but well worth visiting. No one was there when we visited two years ago and we got a personal tour from someone we think was the Curator. It is a strange combination of objects but you’re really there to see the building which was created for a wealthy businessman around 1910. Absolutely stunning.
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g274887-d7619001-Reviews-Customs_and_Tax_History_Museum-Budapest_Central_Hungary.html
Thank you for your tip. I have pinned the museum in my navigation-app. So next time I’m in Budapest, it’s on my radar!
I was in Budapest in 2012, and visited the Bedo/Duna after it had just opened up, so it was fascinating to read about your impressions. It was, at that time, exactly as you’ve written. Three floors of art nouveau cacophony, without rhyme, reason, provenance or explanation. It was so overwhelming…but, in the end, intoxicating…but only because I am such an addict. I spent about three hours there, not including the coffee I collapsed into after finishing the three floors. It was very educational, only because I was forced to group objects in my head, precisely because there was no signage.
When I was there they were selling off the lesser pieces of their collection.
It may have been an ignoble act…but I bought a Magyar art nouveau pelmet/chimney breast tapestry that I like to tell myself was designed by Lechner himself. When it comes to Secessionist work, both the flesh and the spirit are weak! I am looking at it right now, and it still mesmerizes. There were original Thonet pieces, a tray that pooled into the surface of the wood it was sitting upon, corner hanging cabinets that swallowed my heart. I also found a cast iron enamelled art nouveau stove from Brussels—that I already owned, thank god.
I will look forward to reading your impressions of the city when you have a generous period of a week or two to linger in Budapest. With your eagle eye for detail, I will be able to read about all the places I loved: the art nouveau zoo, the mouldering/stunning shopping arcade that smelled of urine and boasted of highly decorative wall panels, encaustic tiles with lovely geometric patterns, muscled torsos emerging from below slightly trefoliate window frames ….and a stunner of a glass dome; the facades of neighbourhood markets with art nouveau proportions; gorgeous, gold leaf half-domes above funeral monuments; synagogue interiors with North African elements, unrestored; the Miksa Roth museum, which is an absolute jewel…the list goes on. In the swishy baths in Buda, one can soak & dream, looking at patterns both above and below that keep the period close. There is a cinema that is pretty intact, still functioning, that boasts marvellous detail for musing about over an inexpensive coffee, with or without taking in the film.
Budapest is a dark town swarming with ghosts from so many different periods. During the current time it makes me horribly uneasy because of the social implications of its politics: it is turning in on itself again, and insisting on an exclusionary nationalism that, as always, spells doom for “the other”. But the treasure there are myriad, and, I hope, more protected than they were when I was there.
I also look forward to your take on Szeged; I’ve not been, and it seems like it would be extravagant, almost like living inside an art nouveau cartoon. Did you stop in Gödölö?
I hope it’s okay to write to this address. I tried to post something in reply, but it kept asking for a URL when I had already put down my website…no doubt I am misinterpreting! caroline cs jonas studio http://www.csjonastudio.com
Hi Caroline, thank you so much for your story. When I read about your adventures, I can’t wait to go back and explore the rest of the city…. You can portray the city so well!
At the moment I have a few blog-subjects in the pipe-line but as soon as time allows, I will write about Szeged and Subotica (in Serbia).
I checked-out your website by the way, and I’m impressed! You are a great artist and your work in beautiful! I reminds me very much of Klimt and the Wiener Secession indeed! Excellent job! I will share your website with my followers on FB. I’m sure they’ll love it too!
Thank you so much for taking the time to go to my website.
As you can see, the particular movement & proportion of line during this period makes such sense to me that I cannot get away from it any more than I can sever my own shadow.
Needless to say, I love reading all you have to say about the period. It is always engaging and informative, with a rigorous, critical eye.
Thank you so much for your fine writing on all things Art Nouveau.
Regards,
caroline jonas
Great article – thanks for sharing!
I have not been to Budapest yet but I have been to one museum that left me with exactly the same feeling as you describe – Pierre Cardin’s Musée Art Nouveau chez Maxim’s in Paris. There are some real gems there but it’s all crammed between a lot of stuff that keeps you wondering why is it even there? I can’t find better words for it than you did: “the result of someone’s compulsive hoarding” 😉
Hi Andrei, that is exactly the impression I got from the pictures at the www. And why I have not felt the urge to go there yet. Maybe, I will visit the place one day, just so I can check it off. But certainly not because I expect to find something there… thanks for warming me!
Hello Olga, Thank you for your Budapestblog. I was there in 2012 and as disapointed as you about the so called privately owned Art Nouveau museum BEDO-HAZ. It is a non selected dump store of mostly second class art nouveau furniture. I visited the museum for applied arts designed by the leading art nouveau architect Odon Lechner and cannot remember anything about the collection because I was so overwhelmed by the architecture of the building. You will find the most prominent art nouveau buildings easy, but I must draw your attention to the ZOO. Not for the animals, but for the architecture of the animal houses in art nouveau. The ZOO is easy to reach by metro and is situated near the Freedom Squire at the end of the boulevard Andrassi Ut. If anyone is interested in art nouveau architecture of Budapest and Hungary you must buy the guide: 225 HIGHLIGHTS HUNGARIAN ART NOUVEAU ARCHITECTURE written by Béla Breda and published by Corvina Guidebooks in 2012 ISBN 978 963 13 6081 3. Fred Westen, The Hague, Netherlands.
Hi Fred, thank you for your well documented information about Budapest. I know there is a lot to see, and the Zoo is definitely on my bucket list! But I will indeed need at least one or two weeks to see everything. So this time, I didn’t even try to see anything. I was heading for Szeged and then traveled on to Subotica and Belgrade… So the whole week was overwhelming as it was already! I will be writing about the restored Synagoge in Subotica in due time, when I have finished working on my photos. (I took só many!) I’ll keep an eye out for the book. Thanks for the tip!
Hi Olga,
The Bedö house is very interesting for its architecture and it is pleasant to visit it. But it is not a real museum. For me it is a mix of museum and shop. As the Villa György Rath, I did not know it and I regret. But I hope to visit it. I have to come back to Budapest. I am looking forward to your article of the Subotica Synagoge. I just saw the exterior when I was there last time.
Hi Claude, we missed you in Szeged! So sorry you couldn’t join us. I will do my best to write a blog about the Subotica Synagoge soon. Have to process my photo’s first though, and I took só many! See you next time?!?
Loved Budapest, have to go back now!
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Hi Kees, thank you for reading my blog. And yes, you should go back. But I think visiting Budapest is never a punishment. 😉
I just visited the Museum of Applied Arts, thinking I was taking the consolation prize since it was Sunday and the Magyar Szecesszio Haza was closed. I dragged three of my traveling companions along, again since it was Sunday. They, as well as I, LOVED it! It was so well done, explained the different influences of Art Nouveau in English, provided beautiful examples of furniture, decorative items, porcelains, even textiles. Also provided was a guide book in English that could be returned after touring. I only wish I’d known about Villa Schiller, as we would have visited it as well.
I don’t feel like I got the consolation prize now, but the real prize!!!
Hi Cynthia, I think you did too! You have visited a well-curated museum now, in stead of a, well … (still can’t get over it). Next time, you’ll visit Villa Schiller and let me know what you thought. Deal?