New exhibit at the Debrecen “Modém”

by OLGS, guest blogger--

I visited Debrecen’s Museum of Modern Art ( A Modém) to see an exhibit titled “SzocReal,” or Socialist Realism art in Hungary from 1949 through 1956. There were a lot of paintings showing toiling peasants and workers, but always with a smile on their faces as their toil was contributing to the new Hungary. Even the ticket-checker on the tram was smiling and the passengers smiled back.

The crowning achievement of the exhibit was the reconstruction of the Budapest Stalin statue (see above). Originally unveiled in 1950 in central Budapest (see below), the statue was pulled down in October 1956 and the head of the dead dictator served as a support for a traffic sign (see below). Red Army forces collected the broken pieces and in some obscure warehouse the pieces have rusted for the past fifty-two years. Incredibly, the curators of the Modém collected the scattered pieces, welded the ten-meter-high monster back together, polished it to a deep bronze, and now it smiles over the exhibit-goers inside the courtyard of the Modém.