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

deliberately destroyed because the marks were against the internal rules of the community; or perhaps some independent potter had worked in the same village and marked his product.’29

Aside from Landsfeld there were others, such as Károly Layer, who considered Ha- ban ceramics folk art. Layer once wrote ‘because of their artistic quality and technical development, they stand at the intersection of folk art and applied art.’30 In the same article, he offers an explanation for his view: he had observed that the impact of

9. Tankard with pewter lid, dated 1655. Faience, Hahan workshop, probably Transylvania or Upper Hungary. Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest, inv. no.: 53.2141

the late Italian Renaissance in early Haban ceramics is lost and ‘motifs are drawn instead from the Hungarian folk idiom’.31 Unfortunately he failed to consider that his conclusions concerning the earlier works were based on later—post-Haban—objects.

10. Hexagonal jar with screw-neck pewter lid, with supposed depictions of the Rákóczi castle in Sárospatak. Faience, Haban workshop, c. 1670, Upper Hungary. Museum of Applied Arts, Budapest, inv. no.: 6632a-b

In his account of the exhibition of the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts’ ceramics collection in 1919, Károly Csányi characterised Haban pieces as follows: ‘In the connecting corridor splendid objects of Hungarian popular folk ceramics are displayed, and among these the Haban faiences are of outstanding value (...) The Ha33