?Fifty young visual authors were invited by new media lab Kitchen Budapest and Dutch designer Annelys de Vet to put their homeland in perspective. Rather than folkloristic clichés, the authors present disarming personal visions based on involvement. Bound together they shed light on today?s Hungarian soul; from the most characteristic vernacular buildings to waterside houses and recycled fences, from the best and worst things in life to innocent nursery rhymes and national fraud, from wine spritzer and salty sticks to vegetable gardens and sold-out products. These unconventional stories together express the way cultural identity is always in motion, influenced from many sides, and multicultural by definition,? the book?s creators say on their website.
As the writer Lajos Parti Nagy says in the introduction to the book: ?Whoever encounters this strange and self-evident book, can learn strange and self-evident things about Hungary.?
?At a quick, unsuspecting glance, the line between nationalism and talking about cultural identity looks hair-fine,? according to de Vet. ?As we were putting together this atlas, this conflict was a constant subject of discussion. This book is meant to show cultural diversity and emphasise personal experience as part of the collective. It thereby underlines that culture is not static but in constant motion and different for everyone,? she said.
?This book does not tell the story of Hungary but an extensive collection of them,? she added.
Among the contributors to the atlas are the graphic desinger Lilla Bölecz, the media and design student Mátyás Czél, the graphic artist Kata Farkas, the architect Zoltán Kovács, the artist Judit Navratil, the graphic artist Zsolt Papp, the interpreter and translator Eszter Pásztor, the archaeologist and architect Miklós Rácz and the architect Noémi Soltész.
The atlas will be presented at the WAMP design fair on Erzsébet Square in the centre of Budapest on Sunday.
Source: Hungarian News Agency (MTI)
