Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 18. (Budapest, 1999)

Maria FERENCZY: The formation of the Hopp-collection. On the 80th anniversary of the foundation of the Ferenc Hopp Museum of Eastern Asiatic Arts

Cf. his correspondence with Joseph Haas, the consul of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in Shanghai, MHDD Nos. 81-84. 48 Glass negatives (size 24x30 cm) in HMDD Nos.: N 2083 (the Moon-gate), N 2084 (bedroom) N 2092 és N 2093 (the sudio), N 2095 (drawing room downstairs), N 2082 (a part of the collection in a room upstairs). 49 Jenő Radisics: ibid. pp. 30-31. 50 A copy of the will, written originally in German and deposited at the public notary under Nr. 1301/1910 is kept in HMDD, No.: A 1200. Another attested copy: Budapesst Museum of Applied Arts, Documentary Dept., No. 10.641. 51 The will cited p. 2. 52 Ibidem pp. 5-16. 53 "Supplement to Ferenc Hopp's will" dated the 22th June 1919. An attested copy of a public notary's document, HMDD No.: A 1396/1 54 The earliest out of them, János Xantus, the founder of the Museum of Ethnography visited the Far East during the 1870 expedition intended originally as a joint Austrian-Hungarian endeavour. Count Péter Vay, titular bishop and Papal protonotary made purchases for the Museum of Fine Arts on state commission in 1906-07 in Japan while visiting the missions in the Far East. Jenő Radisics, the director of the Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest purchased for the Museum of Applied arts on world exhibitions contemporary Oriental works of art of outstanding value. Count Jenő Zichy organised at the end of the last century several scientific expeditions to collect materials and to conduct research into Hungarian prehistory. For instance the Indian works of art from Dr. Theodore Duka, or the collection of Japanese combs and hairpins of Attila Szemere. Duka was General Görgey's aide-de-camp, he became an army surgeon in the emigration, served in India, his name is associated with the saving of Alexander Csoma de Körös's legacy. Attila Szemere was a journalist who, similarly to Ferenc Hopp, travelled out of curiosity and for fun — they met accidentally in Yokohama in June 1883. 56 Today the Ferenc Hopp Museum has outgrown the Hopp villa: the Library, the Documentation Department and temporal exhibitions are still housed there, the art works' store-rooms and the offices are placed at the second floor in the Museum of Applied Arts, the standing exhibition is placed in the György Rath Museum, where the exhibition entitled Collecting Oriental Art in Hungary, as Reflected in the Collections of the Ferenc Hopp Museum of Eastern Asiatic Arts has been displayed since 1997. The first room is dedicated to Ferenc Hopp's memory: it is a reconstruction of a drawing room interior from the home of Ferenc Hopp, with a part of his collection, on the basis of a photograph taken in 1913. This picture was published by Zoltán Felvinczi Takács in the first scholarly description of the Hopp collection, cf. Zoltán Felvinczi Takács, Ferenc Hopp's Collection. In: Magyar Iparművészet Vol. XVII (1914), p. 85. (On the exhibition cf. Mária Ferenczy, Collecting Oriental Art in Hungary, as Reflected in the Collections of the Ferenc Hopp Museum of Eastern Asiatic Arts, Budapest. Exhibition at the Ráth György Museum. In: Ars Decorativa 17. (1998), pp. 139-143.