Hungarian National Gallery Budapest in the Castle Palace
Hungarian National Gallery Budapest in the Castle Palace
The Hungarian National Gallery in the Castle Palace is the largest public collection of Hungarian art. Thematic and historical exhibitions take visitors to different periods of Hungarian art history and the country's past.
The exhibited works of art represent the most important developments of each period from the 11th century to the present. You can take a tour of a collection of stones from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, or view Gothic panel paintings, wooden sculptures and a winged altar, as well as some important works of art from the late Renaissance and Baroque periods. A variety of genres are exhibited through paintings, sculptures, drawings and art illustrations, as well as a coin collection. In the painting section there are works by Hungarian painters between 1800 and 1945, and works by internationally renowned artists of the 19th century such as Bertalan Székely, Mihály Munkácsy and Pál Szinyei Merse can be seen. The sculpture collection includes many Art Nouveau and Symbolist pieces. Turn-of-the-century art is represented by Tivadar Kontka Csontváry and avant-garde artist Lajos Kassák. You will get a taste of the 20th century through the works of constructivist Victor Vasarely, surrealist and gesturalist Simon Hantai and László Moholy-Nagy, who is also known as a teacher at the Bauhaus School in Weimar. The contemporary collection of the Hungarian National Gallery includes artworks linked in one way or another to Hungary from World War II to the present day, and offers an overview of the developments and important artists of the last decades, as well as some artistic features of Hungarian artistic life.
The exhibitions include some works of applied art: carved wooden furniture by the architect Ede Toroczkai Wigand, decorated with folk motifs, porcelain products with Art Nouveau motifs designed by József Rippl-Rónai and produced in the Zsolnay Manufactory for the Andrássy Dining Hall, or the world-famous tubular steel furniture by Marcel Breuer. After the merging of the National Gallery with the Museum of Fine Arts, a completely new exhibition concept was created and applied to present the works of Hungarian artists alongside international masters, with the aim of exhibiting Hungarian art together with international works of fine art and craftsmanship of the same era. This gives visitors the opportunity to interpret each era as a whole and to see the works in the cultural context of that era, thus finding the most important "-isms" and intellectual developments that shaped and influenced the creation of the work. The richness of the permanent exhibitions is therefore continuously ensured by newly acquired, recently restored as well as rare works of art. Accordingly, Paul Cézanne, Camille Pissarro and Claude Monet - considered standard exhibition names - are accompanied by works by Austrian, German, Belgian and Scandinavian artists such as Franz von Lenbach, Wilhelm Leibl or Akseli Gallen-Kallela, giving visitors a comprehensive and detailed overview of European art of the respective era.
Budapest National Gallery
Budapest 1014, Szent György tér 2.
Tel. +36 1 201 9082; +36 20 4397 331; +36 20 4397 325
info@mng.hu