Gábor Eszter: Andrássy Avenue – Our Budapest (Budapest, 2002)

■ Univeróity oh Fine

Ártó

(No. 71 Andrány út)

loan used for the construction, the society had a building erected on the neighbouring plot, which it rented to the ministry of culture, which moved the Academy of Music into the property. (It was on the ground floor of that building, too, that the school of applied arts operated, the rent being paid by the ministry of culture.) With the completion of the Academy of Music in Liszt Ferenc tér,

the

building was left without a function, and the Fine Arts Society sold it. In time it was converted into an office block and an intermediate ceiling was installed in its concert hall. It was left in that sorry state until the mid- 1980s, when it was resolved that the building resume its original function. The banqueting hall was restored to its old form and, next to it, Ferenc Liszt's former apartment was also reconstructed. The latter is now used as a museum. The Old Academy of Music is of uninteresting architectural design, even though the old-fashioned interior has a certain intimate atmosphere. A rare but all the more commendable instance of monument restoration is exemplified here. The building has been restored to its former condition as if nothing had happened in the meantime. The interior spaces are now almost exactly as they once were. That was made much easier by the fact that the building has resumed its original function.

The history of the Palace of Arts has been no less eventful. No sooner had it been completed in 1877 than the building turned out to be insufficient in size to accommodate the sculpture it was meant to display, and its lighting was also 35