Prékopa Ágnes (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 31. (Budapest, 2017)

Diána RADVÁNYI: Changes in the Critical Reception of Haban Ceramics: A Brief History of Research with a Discussion of Some Prominent Viewpoints

In 1877, Imre Szalay introduced the collection of his father, Ágoston Szalay, and in discussing a Haban dish that today is in the collection of the Museum of Applied Arts, he emphasized the collector’s commitment to Hungarian works.2 (Fig.l)

In 1882, when discussing 17,h-century tin-glazed ceramics in Hungary, Károly Pulszky expressed scepticism for Béla Maj- láth’s theory of ‘Dutch potters settled in Hungary’ (in the area of Szobotist), while never using the term ‘Haban’ ceramics.3

Haban ceramics was also displayed as a part of Hungarian art at the National Millennial Exhibition. In his introduction to the objects on display,4 Jenő Radisics referred to the use of tin-glaze as a change in Hungarian ceramics: ‘the use of white tin- glaze spread in the 17th century’ and with this ‘the nature of the dish changed completely’. He describes the characteristic form and glaze of Haban dishes and correctly notes that ‘coats of arms are frequent but even more frequent are dates (...) signalling that the white dishware was made for distinguished families and could not have been very common.’5

In 1915 Radisics wrote that he had placed the Haban objects ‘in the Hungarian room’ of the Hungarian Museum of Applied Arts, which opened in 1897 and was a part of the permanent exhibition.

“When I chose the arrangement mentioned above and made a so-called Hungarian Room, my initial idea was that what interested everybody, including us, in this museum designed to nurture Hungarian applied arts was primarily what our race has created; is there some unique, unmistakable characteristic in what we produce,

2. Oval dish, dated 1610. Faience, Haban workshop, probably

Strachotin, Bohemia. Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest,

inv. no.: 6641

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