In deep waters
Some personal thoughts about the Szentes museum
MúzeumCafé 31.
In the summer of 2007 I took up my post at the Koszta József Museum with a definite plan and a detailed managerial programme. At that time the museum was beginning its transformation. An enormous step forward had been made in 2006 when the museum moved from dilapidated premises into the most attractive building in the town’s main square, a two-storey neo-Renaissance listed edifice of 1883. A new permanent exhibition covering history, ethnography and fine art, as well as temporary exhibitions and a technically well-equipped 1000-square-metre conference room are on the ground floor. The museum in Szentes was expanded with three premises designated for exhibitions. When the museum was established its aims were complex, though the model is still valid: to collect, hold, scientifically analyse and present the estates of former and present residents of the county (today called Észak-Csongrád County). The museum also has the task of assisting public education with museum activities, developing artistic attitudes by holding touring and local exhibitions, and providing cultural enhancement for people in rural areas. However, we cannot pursue the modernisation we have started without state financial support that guarantees funding. New experience, expertise, the material and intellectual resources, and the resulting competence may all be endangered as a result of the imminent reorganisation of provincial museums. They may even disappear without being utilized. Yet regional museums, including the one in Szentes, function directly in their local communities. Treasures held in such museums and values transmitted by them represent both survival and advance for people troubled as a result of the economic-financial crisis and its brutal effect on society.