Agria 38. (Az Egri Múzeum Évkönyve - Annales Musei Agriensis, 2002)

Kiss Péter: A magyarországi első nyilvános és állandó képkiállítás Egerben és a Pyrker-képtár története (1812–1949)

Péter Kiss Hungary's First Public and Permanent Art Exhibition and the History of the Pyrker Picture Gallery (1812-1949) János László Pyrker came to Eger from Venice to take up the post of archbishop in 1827. He brought with him the collection of paintings he had acquired during his time as patriarch of Venice and proceeded to remodel the southern wing of the episcopal palace in Eger with the intention of turning the first floor into an art gallery. It was the first building in Hungary to be built expressly for this purpose. So it was that the picture collection took its final form in Eger. It was a collection influenced by several artists who were active in Eger at the time like Joseph Danhauser for example, who painted several scenes from Pyrker'

s epic poem entitled Rudolf von Habsburg which were to became part of the collection. Copies were made of some of the paintings in the gallery and those pictures in the worst condition were restored. Danhauser'

s work subsequently outgrew the physical constraints of the gallery, and he was left to work on the cathedral, which was then under construction, and paint portraits. When Miklós Barabás arrived in Eger to paint Pyrker'

s portrait, he also painted a copy for the picture gallery as well as a view of the cathedral. When parliament passed legislation raising the funds necessary for the construction of the National Museum the archbishop had no hesitation in donating his pictures to it. The collection, however, stayed in Eger until the building was finished. It was for this reason that from 1836 until the paintings were transported to Pest in 1844, the Hungarian National Museum's art collection could first be seen in Eger. Indeed, Pyrker's efforts were to mean that the collection was to continued to grow whilst it was in the town. The quality of the paintings meant that Pyrker's was the second most important bequest to the Hungarian Museum of Fine Arts behind that donated by the Eszterházys. Although Pyrker's art collection remains the most important art collection the town has ever had it was by no means the first. In 1812, János Fáy had already exhibited his paintings for "the benefit of the public", to use Ferenc Kazinczy's words. The exhibition was open to the public continuously until 1819. It is currently believed to be the first permanent art exhibition in Hungary, predating Samuel Brukenthal's exhibition in Nagyszeben (now Sibiu, Romania) which was opened in 1817. 32