Archaeologist, lecturer, writer, artist – and museologist
Professor Gyula László was born 100 years ago
MúzeumCafé 17.
The centenary of Gyula László’s birth fell on 14 March. He not only enlivened his special academic field in the 30s and 40s, but was also a first-rate lecturer who taught generations of archaeologists. He was the founder of the profession’s scholarly yet popular literature, and his writings and lectures gained many adherents for archaeology. In addition, he was an artist, primarily of graphic art, who had graduated from the Fine Arts Academy. Yet he is rarely remembered as someone who also did much for Hungarian museology, with which he was engaged for 13 years. After World War II he headed the newly formed Department of Medieval History at the Hungarian National Museum. His words are still perceptive today: “Only professional competence and good preparation can constitute the basis of every exhibition.” In the summer of 1934 when he was a student Gyula László joined the Hungarian National Museum as an unpaid trainee. He learnt about excavation methods and the special techniques of inventory taking, restoration and storing. He took part in designing the 1937 new historical exhibition, which opened when Italy’s King Victor Emanuel visited Hungary. It was then that he worked out the method of archaeological ethnography which is associated with his name. The essence is the attempt to describe a whole way of life from archaeological findings with the help of ethnography. He gave a lecture about it at the famous Szárszó conference in 1943 (his political views were close to those of the ‘populist’ writers at the event), and he expounded his ideas in his The Life of the Ancient Hungarians at the time of the Conquest, published in 1944. In his early essays he constantly emphasised the importance of precisely observing archaeological phenomena. For instance, on tomb sketches the location where an object was found must be precisely marked, which at the time was far from being the general practice. His study ‘An Up-to-date Archaeological Museum: Lessons of the exhibition at the Kiev Historical Museum’ appeared in the 1945 volume of The Transylvanian Museum. Gyula László and Nándor Fettich visited the Kiev Historical Museum in the winter of 1941-42 when they studied the exhibited objects in the partly ruined Lavra Monastery. László’s scientific concepts about objects originated in that experience, i.e. he wanted to reveal ancient work processes and ancient society and its life with the help of ethnography. He seemed to have discovered the model of that principle in the Kiev exhibition, which even made him not mind the sometimes primitive ideological approach and rudimentary ways of presentation. (At the time he could not have known, or perhaps from talks with colleagues in Kiev he could partly suspect, what sacrifices the “iron consistency” he observed must have demanded during Stalin’s dictatorship. The wave of terror ‘only’ decimated Ukrainian archaeologists. However, in Belorussia not a single archaeologist was left.) In 1953 László became head of the newly formed Department of Medieval History at the Hungarian National Museum. He had his principles of how to arrange an exhibition. He defined the archaeological objects of a local collection, made the drawings and he himself wrote the texts. (Being a strong person he carried the heaviest cases.) When exhibitions were to be held in the provinces he would pack a loaf of bread and a jar of pork fat, as well as a few sheets of folded brown wrapping paper, a pen and a pencil, and off he would go by the ambling train to his destination. There he observed the rickety cabinets and shabby rooms, laid the wrapping paper on the floor, put the objects out and began to draw and plan. That was how the exhibitions – some of which were still in place in the 1960s – were put together. Implementation followed the preliminary theoretical concept in almost everything. Gyula László was quite aware of the fact that he could have an even bigger effect on the public with this than with his writings. He well understood that it mattered how the use of former objects and the structure of ancient societies were explained to visitors. Spoon feeding with long texts does not appeal to visitors. In 1951 László set up the National Museum’s new exhibition. Unfortunately, neither the catalogue nor the museum guide have survived; however, photographs of the cabinets are still available. The museum’s last exhibition connected to his name opened in the early summer of 1956. He was appointed to design the display marking the 500th anniversary of the Nándorfehérvár (Belgrade) victory over the Turks. However, he didn’t want to end the display with the then published novel by József Darvas, therefore he asked Gyula Illyés to write something. The poem, Hunyadi’s Hand, arrived a day before the opening. The time Gyula László worked with museums and exhibitions represents a unique period in the history of Hungarian archaeological museology. With his creative mind he breathed a fresh spirit into museum rooms. Since then the situation has radically changed. His ideas cannot always be applied in their former sense, yet at the same time we certainly cannot disregard his fundamental principles.