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Ferenc Csák |
Csák, who will leave his post as state secretary in charge of international relations at the Museum of Education and Culture at the end of January, said he had learned much about cultural management in the course of his studies as well as from his official tasks until now.
"I studied economics at university in Regensburg, and I finally got my degree in political science and art history. I finished my internship at the National Gallery in 1997," Csák revealed.
Csák, whose mandate is for five years, said the director of Hungary's best public art collection had to know well the country, the region's culture and the way the system of state institutions operate.
"I have no partisan office, I am not a member of Parliament," Csák said responding to criticism aired since his appointment. He noted that he was not the first state secretary at the Ministry of Education and Culture to take a post as a museum director, citing the example of László Baán, who has done much as the head of the Museum of Fine Arts.
Speaking of his experiences at university in Regensburg, Csák said it wasn't true that the great names of Hungarian art were unknown in Western Europe. They teach everything from Hungarian Romanticism to Hungarian Bauhaus, he added.
Csák said there had been attempts in the past 50 years to raise the profile of Hungarian art, but this work was incomplete. The period has to be included in the whole history of art, he added.
The Hungarian National Gallery's biggest task is to place Hungarian art in an international context, Csák said. Good examples of this are the recent Museum of Fine Arts' exhibition Munich in Hungarian and an earlier exhibition of Hungarian Fauvism that travelled to several venues in France.
Csák stressed the importance of the Hungarian National Gallery's role as a place for research, but said an important task of the institution was also to bring all age groups through its doors. He added that more sponsors had to be found, and that European Union funding might support some developments at the museum.
Source: Hungarian News Agency (MTI) / Photo: MTI
