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

Events 2009-2010

speech. The exhibition organized by the Hungarian Design Council and by curator Gábor Sándor Major on the part of the museum was open until 29 March. The bicentenary of Joseph Haydn's death was commemorated all over the country. The museum's contribution was the exhibition entitled Haydn and Time: Exhibition Commemorating the 200th Anniversary of Joseph Haydn's Death. It provided a good opportunity to put part of the invaluable Esterházy treasury on display, complemented with a few objects related to the composer's life on loan from the Privatstiftung of the Esterházy family in Kismarton (now Eisenstadt, Austria). Alluding to the composer's oratorio Four Seasons, the exhibition was divided into four parts each bearing a season's name. The leading theme - time - was evoked by unambiguous references, ornamental clocks, other timepieces, calendars, tapestries, sculptures, prints on allegorical or mythological themes. The show opened on 21 March under the aegis of the Budapest Spring Festival; therefore it was introduced by the director of the Budapest Festival Centre Zsófia Zimányi, followed by the opening address by the rector of the Liszt Academy of Music András Batta. Open for nearly a year until 7 February 2010, the exhibition was curated by Terézia Bardi, deputy scientific director of the National Trust of Monuments in Hungary. As an attendant program, the Philharmonia Budapest Ltd. entertained the public once a month in the Music Salon held on six occasions in the ceremonial room of the museum and moderated by musicologist János Mácsai. Harmony was the organizing principle of the itinerant exhibition compiled by Kashiwagi Hiroshi, Fukagawa Masafumi, Hagiwara Shu and Kawakami Noriko and coordinated by Andrea Berg: Wa: The Spirit of Harmony; Japanese Design Today. It arrived in Hungary from Paris and could be visited between 8 April and 31 May thanks to the Japan Foundation. The nearly 200 objects on display attested to an alloying of traditional Japanese forms with modern approaches. The visitors could also see interesting examples of environment-conscious thinking resulting in objects from recycled materials. At the opening ceremony speeches were said by Nabekura Shinichi, ambassador of Japan to Hungary, Waketa Munehiro, director of the Japan Foundation, and Dr. Miklós Bendzscl, president of the Hungarian Design Council. On the annual Long Night of the Museums, a new exhibition was also opened in the Museum of Applied Arts. The Kós Károly Association - founded twenty years earlier in autumn 1989 - has been committed from the beginning to organic architecture rooted in the idea of consciously shaping the environment. The exhibition they organized, Creation Is to Be Continued. Hungarian Organic Architecture, open from 20 June to 13 September, included plans, mock-ups and photo documentation selected by the curator János Gerle from the most important creations since the 1960s that best illumined this attitude and creative approach. After the introductory words of Imre Makovecz the exhibition was opened by culture historian Marcell Jankovics. The "journeymen" of the Association made a world model called "World Web" uniting the symbolic systems of diverse religions and philosophies. During the exhibition it was put up in the central glass hall of the museum. This gigantic installation was the decisive element of the program of the Night of Museums: visitors 136