Conception, intention, specialists, money
Compiling contemporary art in Hungary’s public collections
MúzeumCafé 44.
One of the first Hungarian contemporary arts museums – known at the time by its working title as the “Hungarian Luxembourg” – was to be established in the old Kunsthalle, which was joined to the then Museum of Fine Arts on Andrássy Avenue. The idea was for Hungarian contemporary works of art compiled in the Fine Arts Museum but not yet exhibited to at last be removed from storage and presented to the public. The plan was finally realized in 1928 under the name of New Hungarian Picture Gallery and the working title was forgotten. (That probably derived from the fact that the profile of the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris was transformed in 1818. The works of old masters were taken to the Louvre and the Luxembourg became the “museum of living artists”, which at the time meant Delacroix, David and Ingres.) The history of presenting contemporary art in Hungary’s museums began there and continues today in many directions. Almost all museums acquired works of contemporary art. Former county museums, naturally galleries and even the Museum of Labour History and the Kunsthalle, which was to operate as an exhibition space, obtained hundreds and thousands of works by contemporary artists. It is possible to keep collecting, to purchase or accept works as a donation, to stage temporary exhibitions or turn them into a permanent display. However, as soon as collecting stops the compilation ceases to be contemporary, and that is true for every contemporary public collection. Concepts of contemporary art are not written in stone. Although it is difficult to draw the line, a difference is made between post-war and contemporary. It is not enough to know, for example, when an artist was born or the period his oeuvre spans.