Gábor Veress, director of the Dobó István Castle Museum
MúzeumCafé 7.
Ethnographer Gábor Veress was appointed director of Eger’s Dobó István Castle Museum in the summer of 2008. Crafts, household and farming utensils and furniture constitute his special field. As an ethnographer, he has also been involved in studying traditional folk legality and the self-regulation of communities.Castles have always interested me and I have been intrigued how this museum could become even more visitor friendly . The Castle Merrymaking Fairs began in 1997, summer camps have been organised for children, museum education for that age group has become more colourful, and evening and period costume programmes have been launched. After 1990 the number of visitors to county museums fell considerably, while the entire profession had to rethink how to approach a topic from a non-ideological perspective. Using multimedia facilities the jingling of weapons, the tumult of battle and gunpowder smoke can be heard and seen. Museum education can involve children in more exciting activities with a play and enacted siege than with a talk on architectural history. Eger Castle also relates to Géza Gárdonyi and his novel Stars of Eger about the famous 1552 siege. Gárdonyi’s estate, the manuscript of his work are of part of our museum. Today, for the first time the Castle Museum has venues suitable for prestigious foreign exhibitions. An exhibition of armour and medieval attire is coming from the Czech Republic next year, a Mattis-Teutsch exhibition from Sfântu Gheorghe, Transylvania, can be seen in the autumn and we are planning to show a Swedish Viking collection in 2010.