Budapest Buildings

I usually try to avoid having people in photographs but here the couple emerging onto the steps of the Museum of Fine Arts show its scale and grandeur.

It was completed in 1906, much more recently than I had supposed, so was never a royal palace or the like. It differs from three of the principal London galleries (National Gallery, Tate, National Portrait Gallery) because it has not been modernised; only modern lifts have been installed. It makes me wonder why directors of UK galleries and museums yearn to bugger them up with new extensions, elevators, new entrances and so on most of which are designed to accommodate restaurants and shops – but they don’t say this of course.

There is a special exhibition: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, William Blake and His Contemporaries. If there were any pictures not lent by the Tate I didn’t see them. It was well attended by a young audience. Somehow works by Reynolds, Romney and Turner found their way into the show but surprisingly did not look out of place. This was the hors d’oeuvre for the permanent collection displayed over three floors.

I particularly enjoyed work by Hungarian artists in the 17th and 18th centuries because it was all new to me, although they were heavily influenced by their contemporaries in Western Europe. The rest of the permanent collection had good work by French, Dutch and German artists principally. I am an irritating companion in these circumstances as I sometimes say that my brother has one of those and then, after a pause, at least “ascribed to”.

There was nothing after 1800 – for that you have to cross Heroes’ Square to the Hall of Art, another neo-classical corker built by the same architects as the Museum of Fine Arts and completed in 1896. Twelve years earlier the Hungarian State Opera House was opened.

“It is a richly decorated building and is considered one of the architect’s masterpieces. It was built in neo-Renaissance style, with elements of Baroque. Ornamentation includes paintings and sculptures by leading figures of Hungarian art including Bertalan Székely, Mór Than and Károly Lotz. Although in size and capacity it is not among the greatest, in beauty and the quality of acoustics the Budapest Opera House is considered to be amongst the finest opera houses in the world.” (Wikipedia)

On Sunday afternoon, after Lohengrin was over, there was a concert of Wagner pieces – a good way to see the opera house as well as hear some great Hungarian artists, two of whom had performed earlier in the nearly five hour marathon.