Karácsony's plan will be fleshed out by chief architect at the Professional Service for the Protection of Cultural Heritage Zsolt Szécsi, and the structure to connect the extension with the museum's existing building will be designed by the architect István Mányi, museum director László Baán said.
The new extension will enable the museum to provide additional functions and services, without which a modern European museum cannot exist today, Baán said. There will be space for temporary exhibitions, an area for children's activities, a lecture room, a cafeteria, a restaurant and a museum shop.
The 6,000-square-metre underground extension will be built in front of the museum and along its western side. Only a glass cube will reveal it on the surface.
Baán noted that the culture minister had originally commissioned the Professional Service for the Protection of Cultural Heritage to prepare the plans for the extension, but the museum's management decided that some of Hungary's other outstanding architects should also become involved. As the by-laws of the Chamber of Hungarian Architects prohibits tenders for projects already in the planning stages, the museum and the professional service invited proposals instead of bids. Seven were submitted by the February 4 deadline.
Architect Péter Reimholz, a member of the Art Advisory Body commissioned by the museum, said that proposals were assessed in view of both the underground and above-ground structures to be built. The Art Advisory Board decided that Karácsony's proposal included a unique solution from both an architectural and a functional aspect.
The Art Advisory Body was chaired by Baán and chief director of the Professional Service for the Protection of Cultural Heritage Gábor Virágos. The co-chair was István Eltér and members included Reimholz, art historian Ferenc Dávid and Hungary's chief architect Sándor Fegyverneky.
Chairman of the Chamber of Hungarian Architects István Eltér has expressed hope that the long-planned rehabilitation of Heroes' Square, in front of the museum, will take place at the same time as the museum extension. The HUF 3.8 billion project - which the government has made a priority project for European Union and state development funding - is expected to start in the spring of 2009 and be completed some time in 2010.
Source: Múlt-kor / Hungarian News Agency (MTI)
