“Two things moved me: I wanted to set up teams and to share what I saw with others.”
Anna Lakos, Research Director, Hungarian Theatre Museum and Institute
MúzeumCafé 33.
Anna Lakos from the Hungarian Theatre Museum and Institute (HTMI) was presented with the Officer in the Order of Arts and Letters award by the Director of the French Institute on 5 November 2012. She received the prize for her life achievement, her activity including translations, and organising guest performances of French theatre and dance companies in Hungary. On several occasions she has organized Hungarian theatre weeks in Paris and French theatre weeks in Budapest. What she is most proud of is having brought Pina Bausch to Hungary. Her work is embedded in the HTMI, where she has worked since 1985. The institute’s most important endeavour is to grasp the unfathomable moment, which experience shows is almost impossible. As soon as the performance ends it has gone by; you can try to document and reconstruct it, but it usually has an effect on the night as if it was valid only then. The memory of a legendary performance lasts for a few decades and then fades. In the course of time what and how to collect in relation to the theatre has changed and technological development has extended theatrical genres, transforming the collecting and modernizing museum presentation. The HTMI and its exhibition venue, the Gizi Bajor Actors’ Museum, celebrated their 60th anniversary with the 41st issue of the Review of Theatre Studies, which was edited by director Piroska Ács and Anna Lakos. The studies were all contributed by the institute’s staff and provide an overall view, analysing where the HTMI is today in terms of collecting, processing and presentation. To mark the anniversary, an exhibition about the past 60 years can be currently seen at the Gizi Bajor Actors’ Museum. It opened in October and runs until March.