Arts, Culture, Creativity

The culture of Hungary has a distinctive style of its own, diverse and varied music, architecture, literature, art and gastronomy. Our age-long traditions assimilate characteristics of various different nations (due to the country’s history) and we are proud that our culture doesn’t stop at the borders of Hungary. Because of our unique language, Hungarian literature isn’t widely spread, but it’s still no obstacle for Hungarian writers to reach world success. Sándor Márai is for example appreciated world-wide or Imre Kertész who received the Nobel-Prize in Literature (Fateless, 2002). We celebrate the Day of Hungarian Culture since 1989 every year on 22nd January in remembrance of Ferenc Kölcsey who finished our national anthem on this day in 1823.

Music

„Hungarian folk songs are the mirror to Hungarian soul, it’s as old as the language itself; the tradition of folk music is a value as important as our mother language, since it was brought up together with our age-long history. We can all get to know ourselves, and others can get to know us through folk music.”

(Zoltán Kodály)

Folk music is one of the most important tools to express ourselves, it reflects the history, the language and dance of our nation. In contrary to our language, which belongs to the Finno-Ugrian phylum, our folk music originates from Inner-Asia. Several studies have revealed similarities between Hungarian and Chinese folk music.

Our folk music is one of the most diverse and colorful ones in the world. Two great music geniuses, Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály recognized how highly important and valuable folk music was and launched the most intensive folk song collection project ever. Thanks to their work the level of musical education rose significantly.

Not only folk music but also art-music has great traditions in Hungary. We come across famous artists’ names even if we only look through the Hungarian music history of the 20th century. Bartók and Kodály had great influence on these artists. Although both of them started their work in the field of folk music, they developed further in different orientations. Kodály’s art was still strongly influenced by folk dance, while Bartók diverged from this tendency and became an important personality of the world’s music history.

The most important Hungarian composers of the 20th century are Ernő Dohnányi, Leó Weiner, Sándor Balassa, Attila Bozay, Zsolt Durkó, Miklós Kocsár, György Kurtág, István Láng, György Ligeti, Rudolf Maros, András Mihály, Emil Petrovics, József Soproni, Sándor Szokolay, András Szőllősy, László Dubrovay, Peter Eötvös, Máté Victor, János Decsényi, Barnabás Dukay, Levente Gyöngyösi, György Orbán and György Selmeczi.
Our famous conductors: Antal Doráti, Jenő Ormándy, Frigyes Reiner, György Solti.

We have to mention the two greatest composers of the 19th century Ferenc Erkel and Ferenc Liszt. Erkel composed the music of the Hungarian national anthem and we connect the birth of the Hungarian national opera with him. Ferenc Liszt lived abroad already as a child and became a dominant figure in the field of classical music.

Popular music

In the last 15 years many pop festivals came to life, focusing on the youth seeking for entertainment. One of these is the widely known Sziget Fesztivál, with thousands of international visitors. There many more popular music events like Hegyalja Fesztivál, VOLT Fesztivál or Balaton Sound, but even more music festivals of local and global importance enrich the Hungarian cultural life

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Architecture

Regarding Hungarian architecture we can look back to the times of the Settlement of Hungarians or the foundation of the state. In the times of Saint Stephen I. many workers from abroad helped constructions, and, as a result, an Italian influence could be seen. The Roman style started to take shape in these years in forms of basilicas and cathedrals.

Later Byzantine and French had great affect on our architecture. Thanks to the French connections of Esztergom the Cistercian Order showed up, which brought a new dominant style into Hungarian architecture. Until the 14th century we can see the development on churches and royal buildings, later the typical examples of the civilian architecture evolved, too. The Renaissance, the Muslim architecture during the Turkish occupation, later the Baroque all left significant memories in Hungary.

in the 18th century spiritual architecture dominated again with Southern German impacts, while secular buildings still saw strong French influence. The motives of The Versailles Castle were reproduced by Esterházy Castle of Fertőd, which already showed the signs of Rococo, too. The most beautiful example of the late Baroque castles is Grassalkovich Castle in Gödöllő. It is interesting to mention the importance of this castle: an entire tendency, the so-called Grassalkovics castle style emerged afterwards.

Beginning from the 18th and 19th century, several great Hungarian architects was worth whole chapters, let some of them stay here as examples, along with one of their most important buildings:

• Frigyes Feszl (Pesti Vigadó)
• Alajos Hauszmann (New York Palace)
• József Hild (Esztergom Basilica)
• Károly Kós (Szekler National Museum, Sepsiszentgyörgy)
• Ödön Lechner (Museum for Arts and Crafts)
• István Medgyaszay (Petőfi Theatre in Veszprém)
• Mihály Péchy (Great Church in Debrecen)
• Mihály Pollack (Hungarian National Museum)
• Frigyes Schulek (Fisherman’s Bastion)
• Imre Steindl (Parliament)
• Miklós Ybl (Opera)

The new waves of the 20th century enriched the Hungarian architecture. Béla Lajta is often referred to as the first modern Hungarian architect. He followed Ödön Lechner and tried to bring Western European elements into our architecture. The World War I. broke the swing but later between the two wars new styles appeared. The Bauhaus was favored by many artists, the CIAM’s Hungarian department worked hard on popularize Bauhaus in Hungary (Farkas Molnár, József Fischer, Marcell Breuer).

After the World War II. rebuilding was the first task for the country and immediately after that the Social Realism arrived with the Russian occupancy. After the 60s new ideas gathered ground (Zoltán Farkasdy, József Finta, Zoltán Gulyás, György Jánossy, Károly Jurcsik, Péter Molnár, etc.). Leaving traditional forms behind, developing an organic form of architecture – was the motto of two Hungarian architects György Csete and Imre Makovecz. Imre Makovecz built many outstanding buildings, he was the designer the Hungarian Pavilion for the World Expo 1992 in Seville.

László Hudec

The name of László Hudec is relatively unknown in Hungary, although he is one of the most famous Hungarian architects in the world. He was born in 1893 in Besztercebánya, which was, at that time, part of Hungary. His father was an acknowledged building contractor, therefore he came close to the profession soon.

He started his studies in 1910 at the Budapest University of Technology. He graduated in Architecture in 1914. He started to work at Ervin Ybl’s bureau, but soon he had to join the Hungarian Army. During the I. World War he fell into captivity by the Russians, but managed to escape two years later and fought his way to China to settle down in Shanghai. First he was employed by an American bureau before he established his own architect studio.

He designed 65 buildings altogether, many of which are still standing. Among his buildings we can find private residences and also public institutions – theatre, hospital, university, church, hotel and cultural center. The tallest building of Shanghai in the second half of the 20th century was also his work: the Park Hotel with its 83,8 meters and 22 stores, built in 1934, was the tallest building in Eastern Asia between the two World Wars.

Initiated by Hungarian diplomacy a Hudec Year was held in Shanghai in 2008. Many publications told the story of the Hungarian architect. Visitors could take a bus-tour showing the spectacular buildings of László Hudec

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Cuisine

The Hungarian cuisine is a prominent feature of Hungarian culture. The diversity of the primary materials used, spices and methods of cooking and preparing make it really special. The traditional Hungarian cuisine is very rich in various tasty dishes, although we might not always consider them healthy. Still, modern Hungarian gastronomy finds excellent variations for traditional recipes, which maintain the balance between classic tastes and healthy nutrition. Our most traditional dishes, which are also well-known abroad, are goulash, Hungarian fish soup, stuffed cabbage, chicken paprikash, potato paprikash, various pork dishes, Hungarian bean soup or túrós csusza (dumplings with fresh quark cheese and thick sour cream).

Important elements of Hungarian gastronomy are our excellent wines that are available in a broad selection. Our most important wine-districts are Tokaj, Eger, Szekszárd, Villány-Siklós, Badacsony and Sopron.

Among our drinks, palinka is unmatched in the world, distilled from 100 percent fruits. Due to successful efforts made in the past few years, Hungary became the only country entitled to use the name palinka for this fine drink, whose identity serves as a basis of its own culture.

Hungary is very rich in subsurface water supplies; many of them can be directly used as mineral water. Numerous international awards prove the quality of Hungarian mineral waters.