Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 28. (Budapest, 2012)

Balázs SEMSEY: Architecture and Museology at the End of the 19th Century

2. Part of the permanent exhibition with the Sóly gallery, photo: Antal Weinwurm, 1897 (MAA Archive F

LT 6056) day venue in 1897, before the museum was opened to the public.

2 A central goal in organizing the first permanent exhibition - and by other means, in the interior and exterior decoration of the entire building - was the presentation of ornaments conceived as specifically Hungarian at that time. Inspired by this thought, the director of the museum Jenő Radisics collected a great portion of works of Hungarian decorative arts in one room, "without regard to the materials".

3 When the museum opened to the public at last on 20 November 1897, the installation had not been completely finished, but the "Hungarian room" which emphasized the national character of the institution also in the way of presentation could be visited from the start.

4 The Sóly gallery set against the western wall of the elongated room and the Maksa ceiling enframed as it were the objects of a variety of genres displayed in the glass casses and along the walls.

5 Although the exhibition was often reshuffled over the next decades resulting in different combinations of exhibited objects, the conception of showing together a collection of artefacts by craftsmen active in the territory of Hungary (thus automatically regarded as Hungarian) and the mentioned church 8