György Szegő is a Jászai Mari Prize laureate (1995), recipient of the Miklós Ybl Prize (2014), the Silver Carpenter’s Pencil Award (2017), and the Flórián Kováts Memorial Medal; architect, interior architect, industrial artist, visual designer, art writer; Meritorious Artist of the Republic of Hungary (2002) and Distinguished Artist of Hungary (2016).
“Somewhere I once read – perhaps I even wrote it down already – that the Ancient Greek term architekton is a compound concept. Its prefix means ruler, its suffix means master carpenter. Activities far removed from one another, yet when bound together, this etymology also conveys the magical power of architecture. This enchantment is necessary, because in antiquity architecture could even mean scheming. Today, this threatening side effect that permeates the entire world must be counteracted by the architect himself, with the help of other artists. In the broadest sense: this is the shared task of the creative and performing arts.”
György Szegő: Műleírás / válogatott művészeti, építészeti írások (Description of Works / Selected Writings on Art and Architecture), 2008–2020. MMA Publishing House, 2020.
Summary of the career
György Szegő defended his degree in architecture in 1972 at the Budapest University of Technology. As his diploma project, he designed the King Matthias Museum in Visegrád – with distinction (opponents: Frigyes Pogány and Ferenc Merényi).
Between 1972 and 1973 he worked as an architect at the Budapest Urban Planning Design Company. From 1973 to 1976 he also completed the interior architecture program of the Hungarian University of Applied Arts, graduating in 1976 (his diploma project was a Design Headquarters on Vitkovits Mihály Street – supervisor: Sándor Mikó). His further mentors included the painter Iván Máriási, as well as architects József Szincsák and György Szrogh. In 1992 he was a student of the summer university Felix Meritis in Amsterdam; his master there was Greg Lynn, a world-renowned figure of organic contemporary architectural design. He defended his DLA degree in 1999 at the Budapest University of Technology (opponents: Ferenc Vámossy and István Ferencz).
Between 1976 and 1978, at the Budapest Open-Air Theatre he worked as chief scenographic engineer, designing and renewing the auditoriums and stage-technical elements. He was responsible for the technical background of the performances of the Arts Weeks.
From 1978 to 1987, as set and stage designer of the Csiky Gergely Theatre, he achieved international recognition. One of the theatre’s – and the period’s – most successful productions was Marat halála (The Death of Marat) by Peter Weiss, for which he was the scenographer. In 1982, the production won the Grand Prize of the BITEF, and as designer he also received the Silver Medal of the Novi Sad Scenography Triennial.
As a theatrical designer, he has created the stage designs for nearly 150 productions and approximately 20 costume designs.
In addition to the Csiky Gergely Theatre, he designed sets for the Budapest Operetta Theatre, the Győr National Theatre, the Katona József Theatre of Kecskemét, the Szigligeti Theatre of Szolnok, the Miskolc National Theatre, the Hevesi Sándor Theatre, the Szeged Open-Air Festival, the open-air theatre of the Dominican Courtyard at the Budapest Hilton Hotel, the Hungarian State Opera House, the Erkel Theatre, and Studio K Theatre. He also worked in Cluj-Napoca and Komárno. He served as curator, designer, and/or author of studies for several Hungarian national presentations at the Prague Quadrennial, in collaboration with Nóra Welmann and Timea Turnai. Between 1992 and 1999, he was president of the Association of Hungarian Stage Designers.
Teaching activity: From 1989 to 2001 he taught stage and set design at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts, and between 1997 and 2001 he taught art history at the University of Jewish Studies (ORZSE).
Alongside his work as a stage designer, his activity as a cultural and architectural critic and writer is also significant.
He wrote for numerous periodicals, including Magyar Építőművészet, Művészet, Új Tükör, Magyar Nemzet, Élet és Irodalom, Új Művészet, Fotóművészet, Kritika, Múlt és Jövő, Szombat, Balkon, Magyar Hírlap, Országépítő, Atrium, Ökotáj, Népszabadság, Octogon, as well as Színház. He served as editor of Fotóművészet, Delta Impulzus, and Balkon. Between 1999 and 2002 he was a senior contributor to Atrium magazine. He is the author or co-author of numerous books. From 2001 onward he has been editor-in-chief of the journal Magyar Építőművészet and founding editor-in-chief of its theoretical supplement, Utóirat.
He held solo fine art exhibitions at the Bercsényi Gallery, the Young Artists’ Club, the Fészek Club, and the Pécs Youth House, as well as in Munich and Basel.
From the 1980s onward he curated and designed numerous architectural and fine art exhibitions. One of the most significant among them was Álmok Álmodói – Világraszóló Magyarok (Dreamers of Dreams – World-renowned Hungarians), presented in 2001–02. Together with János Gerle, he served as co-curator and scenographer of the Hungarian Pavilion at the 7th Venice Architecture Biennale in 2000; the exhibition was titled Új Atlantisz felé (Toward a New Atlantis).
From 2014 he has served as artistic director of the Műcsarnok (Kunsthalle). During his directorship, together with György Fekete, he relaunched the institution of the National Art Salons. Attendance at the Kunsthalle increased significantly, in several years rising to three times its previous figures. Over the decade beginning in 2014, more than 200 exhibitions were presented at the Kunsthalle.
The designer–architect
After obtaining his degree in architecture, he began his design career at the BUVÁTI planning office. Soon he was entrusted with an independent assignment – the design of a service building – and thus quickly experienced the disillusioning operation of socialist construction industry institutions, which placed productivity above all else. This situation was further exacerbated by the 1973 oil crisis, which also reached the countries of the Eastern Bloc, leading to a significant decline in the volume of design commissions at planning companies. Work often consisted of undignified tasks. For György Szegő, a possible way out of this situation was offered by the encouragement of Frigyes Pogány, then rector of the Hungarian University of Applied Arts, who urged him to complete the interior architecture program there as well. At the time, it was an emerging practice for architects such as Ernő Rubik, Cézár Herrer, and Balázs Szili to continue their studies in the university’s postgraduate program after graduating from the Budapest University of Technology. Alongside the cross-semester training, sufficient free time remained for design work. At that time, a so-called KK (extra-budgetary) office operated within the Housing Department of the Budapest University of Technology – effectively a private design office. Under the leadership of Miklós Kapsza and József Shall, this proved to be a sound professional practice. Initially, he became involved in designing details for the Vasas Sports Hall. Soon thereafter, he had the opportunity to apply what he had learned in the interior architecture program while preparing the conceptual plans for the Belvárosi Üzletközpont (City Mall) / Kígyó Passage. During these college years, alongside design commissions, there was also time to participate in competitions, which – beyond the practical demands of everyday work – provided a form of creative release. Around this time, he also formed friendships with young researchers at a nearby institution, who introduced him to the then-emerging analytic psychology of Lipót Szondi – comparable to that of Carl Gustav Jung. From this intellectual milieu later grew György Szegő’s internationally noted Szondi Test for Instinctive Architecture.
After obtaining his second degree in interior architecture, his interest turned toward scenography. His attraction to theatrical work was not without precedent: already at the Budapest University of Technology, and later at the Hungarian University of Applied Arts, he was an enthusiastic student of the scenography course taught by Lajos Tolnai, who often took his students “to the field,” offering insight into the technical backstage workings of theatrical performances as well. He first applied for scenographer positions at the Vígszínház, and later at the Budapest Open-Air Theatres – successfully in the latter case. From the outset, he found a shared tone with director Ferenc Katona, a legendary stage director and theoretical writer. One of Szegő’s significant design achievements here was the creation of glass-fibre-reinforced plastic auditorium seats – from design through to execution. At the time, this was considered almost space-age technology; shipbuilders were involved in both the design and manufacturing processes. Audiences gratefully welcomed the replacement of the wooden benches that deteriorated year after year during winter. From an ergonomic standpoint, the seats proved comfortable and remained in service for more than thirty years. Following the success of the auditorium seating, further design commissions found György Szegő, now on an architectural scale. The acoustic portal of the Budai Park Stage, the choir riser of the Margaret Island Open-Air Stage, and the scenographic towers of the Városmajor Open-Air Stage were all successful works executed in glass-fibre-reinforced polyester. Subsequently, he was commissioned as designer for the sanitary pavilions of the Kamaraerdei Youth Park. His design partner was shipbuilder Imre Scholz, who contributed his expertise in production design alongside the creative concept. The pavilions’ futuristic shell-dome form – alongside the tent roofing – became the institution’s other defining visual emblem.
Competitions are also important components of his work as a designer–architect, which he pursued continuously from the early 1970s onward. Following his diploma project at the Budapest University of Technology, in the same year another of his competition entries received an acquisition prize; in it, he designed a horizontally structured modular housing complex based on the structure of honeycombs. Among his more significant competition works is the design competition announced by the Japanese publisher Shinkenchiku Bunka, entitled “Micro Living Space, Healthy Mind in a Healthy Home.” The competition design by György Szegő, co-authored with Mariann Nagy, proposed residential capsules whose windows opened and closed like an iris – an idea that still appears innovative today. He later prepared, together with Gábor Bachmann, a design for the furnishings competition of the Club of the Békéscsaba Youth House (1976), winning first prize. Here again, innovative ideas came to the fore: furniture forms creatively variable from bent plywood elements. Similarly successful was the plan he created with Emil Valker for the furnishings competition announced by the Hungarian Furniture Industry Association for the Lada Office Building in Togliatti (1977). With the first prize, they also won the tender for the Association.
In 1977, the “Whirling Spiral Theatre” design prepared for the OISTAT competition – co-authored with Sarolta Ecsedy and Illés Szabó – already foreshadowed Szegő’s later “active” scenic elements through its spiral-moving auditorium. He conceived similarly innovative solutions together with Edit Kádár (software), László Mérő (mathematics), and László Sümegi (industrial design) for the idea competition of the Japanese company Seiko in 1984. They effectively “invented” precursors of today’s smart devices and interactive experiences; even by today’s standards, their entry was a radically innovative project. His architectural design attitude continued to be marked by competitions decades later. Noteworthy is the Urban Planning and Architectural Design Competition for the City Center of Budapest’s 13th District, prepared with András Kapitány in 2007; their futuristic plan did not lead to an acquisition as a prize. In 2012, he worked with the team of KÖZTI led by Miklós Marosi on a competition proposal for the renovation of the Museum of Applied Arts. Szegő designed a contemporary Zsolnay Pavilion for Angyal István Square at the corner of Üllői Road and the Grand Boulevard, envisioning it as an external museum entrance.
Theatre scenography
In the years following his graduation, theatre increasingly became his passion; he frequently travelled even to performances in Kaposvár, and the desire to design stage sets himself gradually took shape. Thus, when Gyula Pauer left Kaposvár in 1978, Szegő successfully applied for the vacant position of stage designer. The fruitful decades spent in Kaposvár are marked by numerous set and costume designs. Among them, the most outstanding is Marat / Sade (Marat/Sade) by Peter Weiss – whose full title is Jean-Paul Marat üldöztetése és meggyilkolása, a charentoni elmegyógyintézet színjátszó csoportjának előadásában (The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton). Marat halála (The Death of Marat) (1981) became a cult work of Hungarian culture, remembered with admiration by theatre audiences to this day. Socialist cultural policy could “neither swallow it nor spit it out.” By the time the cultural authorities of the era “discovered” the masterfully articulated system critique embedded in the performance, the production had already amassed such significant international awards that the Kádár regime no longer dared to risk banning it. The performances had an immense, elemental impact on audiences and were surrounded by laudatory reviews. The company was invited to guest performances – first to Budapest, then onto the international stage. In 1982, the jury of BITEF praised the production in superlatives, awarding it the festival’s Grand Prize as well as two additional major awards – the director was János Ács. This was followed by performances in Metz, Nancy, Berlin, Karlsruhe, Kraków, and, in the era of glasnost, Moscow. The Death of Marat is an inescapable achievement in the history of Hungarian theatre.
Significant stage designs in Kaposvár followed one another in quick succession, while there was still capacity for guest design work at numerous theatres across the country. Also in 1981, as a guest designer, he worked in Győr on the set design for Bambini di Praga (Bambini di Praga). The play, adapted from a work by Bohumil Hrabal, was staged by director János Szikora. Six stage designers were invited to contribute to the mobile scenography of the enormous stage. The production became one of the first major successes of the newly built theatre, but due to its system-critical overtones it was banned. Cultural policy punished the creators in various ways; György Szegő was barred from theatrical design work in Budapest, though he was allowed to continue working in Kaposvár. This partial silencing lasted until 1989.
In his Kaposvár stage designs, Szegő frequently employed moving scenic elements. A characteristic example is the musical Candide (Candide) (Voltaire–Wheeler–Bernstein), in which the changing backdrops appeared on panels rotating like ship’s oars, actively moving the performers. In Werthert már megírták (Werther Has Already Been Written) (Kataev–Bereményi), the set walls moved across the stage like the pages of a giant book; in Nehéz Barbara (Difficult Barbara) (Jezek–Voskovec–Werich), scene changes were generated by revolving, door-like curtain–excavator blades. In Bulgakov’s Bíbor sziget (The Crimson Island), a parodistic cruiser Aurora – the revolution itself – burst into the theatre. The entire set of Marat halála (The Death of Marat) was constructed from bath grates; by moving and struggling with them, the actors enacted the anarchic turmoil of the French Revolution. Finally, the tragic ending evoked the Hungarian Revolution of 1956: in the finale, a giant photo curtain suddenly and tragically revealed Budapest’s Corvin Passage. In these total works of art, the scenography of actor and set breathed together.
During his Kaposvár period, Szegő represented the avant-garde direction of stage design. He broke with the tradition of static backdrops and fixed spaces characteristic of conventional set design. In their place, architecture itself came to the fore on stage: built structures that could be physically traversed assumed the leading role in defining locations. In Szegő’s theatrical architecture, he often constructed moving stage architectures, which powerfully enhanced the impact of meaning through their interaction with the dynamics of the performances.
His theatrical work was recognized in 1995 with the Jászai Mari Prize.
Journalistic and professional writing
The years preceding the political transition allowed for less theatrical design activity due to him being banned. Friends familiar with Szegő’s earlier fine-art creative and curatorial texts encouraged him to turn toward writing. He published fine-art and architectural criticism in the “transition-era” Élet és Irodalom (Life and Literature) and in the “old” Magyar Nemzet (Hungarian Nation). At the latter, he was soon invited to become a regular external contributor. Around the time of the regime change, borders opened; it became easy to travel, for example, to Vienna, Munich, Berlin, or Paris, to experience these trips as exhibition study tours and to publish reviews brought back from them. Szegő continues to regard it as important to follow European cultural life alongside that of Hungary. He reported ever more frequently on exhibitions abroad. He was invited to the editorial boards of several cultural journals; for example, Delta Impulzus, the engineering magazine of the National Office of Monuments, asked him to head its cultural section.
He was also invited to the editorial staff of Fotóművészet, from which a long-term collaboration spanning several decades developed. Szegő’s presence at Fotóművészet facilitated permeability between visual genres. A similarly productive collaboration developed with Új Művészet, alongside parallel work for other periodicals.
He was commissioned to write professional and cultural articles by Magyar Építőművészet (Hungarian Architecture), Új Művészet , Új Tükör, Magyar Nemzet, Élet és Irodalom, Fotóművészet, Kritika, Múlt és Jövő, Szombat, Balkon, Octogon, Magyar Hírlap , the Budapest supplement of Népszabadság, Színház, Ökotáj, and Országépítő. In 1992, he was invited to take up the position of senior contributor at Atrium, an architectural magazine.
When Magyar Építőművészet was relaunched in 1996, its editor-in-chief invited him to join the editorial board. The professional journal endured turbulent times, which led to the resignation of Mihály Vargha in 2001. At that point, György Szegő was invited to become editor-in-chief of the journal founded a hundred years earlier by Ödön Lechner and Alajos Hauszmann – a role he has fulfilled with care and perseverance ever since. The journal continued with a new column structure and new typography. Over the two decades since, its structure and graphic design have been renewed several times, while retaining its core approach of presenting architecture and the visual sister arts as each other mutually sublimating values. The consistently high standard of MÉ was recognized in 2010 with the Kós Károly Award – in the Collective category.
Alongside his editorial and professional writing activities, Szegő György is the author and/or co-author of numerous books. In the early 1980s, he began by writing exhibition catalogues, such as those accompanying Ösztönépítészeti teszt (Instinctive Architecture Test) and Építészeti tendenciák Magyarországon 1968–81 (Architectural Trends in Hungary 1968–81) (Budapest Gallery, Tendencies Project, 1982). In the early 1990s, he became co-author of a book series presenting Catholic, Reformed, and Lutheran churches in Hungary (1995). In 1996, he wrote on Hungarian participation in the Venice Biennales for an anniversary anthology. Among his key books is Teremtés és átváltozás (Creation and Transformation), which examines the architecture of Secessionist Budapest and the symbolism of architectural ornamentation (1996). He elaborated on the topic of symbol psychology in Privátfotó Szimbólumszótár (Private Photography Symbol Dictionary, 1998) – its background being his participation in the private-photography research initiated in the 1980s at the Institute for Cultural Research by András Bán and Péter Forgács. Filling an important gap was the exhibition and volume on the oeuvre of Lipót Baumhorn, created with András Hadik and Zsuzsa Toronyi (1997). Another significant architecture-related book is 111 év / 111 híres ház / 150 magyar építész (111 Years / 111 Famous Buildings / 150 Hungarian Architects), co-authored with Péter Haba (2003).
Among Szegő’s books, an important place is occupied by selection-type volumes in which he republishes his previously published writings in the form of a systematically organized anthology. These volumes will also be significant for posterity; among them there are already works that count as required reading in Hungarian art education. The first in this series was Építő áldozat (Building Sacrifice, 1998), in which he brought together his art-critical and cultural writings from 1981 to 1998. Another selection volume is Táj–templom–szobor (Landscape–Church–Sculpture), which collects his architectural writings from 1997 to 2007 (2008). His most recent and most comprehensive selection book is Műleírás (Description of Works, 2021); in this volume, according to an overarching interdisciplinary system of organization, Szegő’s writings can be read across the fields of fine art, architecture, art theory, and cultural policy. His editorial, professional-writing, cultural, and educational activities within the architectural profession were recognized in 2017 with the Silver Carpenter’s Pencil Award.
Curatorial and exhibition-directoral activity
In the mid-1980s, the forced decline in theatre commissions gave Szegő the opportunity to increasingly engage with other fields of visual culture. From 1985 onward, he took on leading roles in the design and curatorship of a growing number of exhibitions. In 1997, together with the fine artist Levente Thury, he curated the exhibition Diaszpóra (és) művészet (Diaspora (and) Art) at the Jewish Museum of Budapest. Owing to the enormous success of this historical and contemporary selection, it became evident not only to the participants that modern and contemporary art exist in the diaspora. At the same venue, an exhibition connected to architectural-historical research presented the oeuvre of Lipót Baumhorn (1998), curated together with András Hadik. With him – in cooperation between the Association of Hungarian Architects and the Hungarian Museum of Architecture – Szegő later organized the exhibition Építészet és ornamentika (Architecture and Ornament) in Paris (2010); this exhibition subsequently travelled to Brussels and Tokyo. Exhibitions followed one another in rapid succession. In 1998, at the Kunsthalle, he curated – together with László Beke and Krisztina Jerger – the exhibition Látvány / magyar művészet a színház és a film között (Spectacle / Hungarian Art Between Theatre and Film), which became a major success. The exhibition filled the entire Kunsthalle, presenting the work of significant stage designers through sets conceived with a fine-art sensibility. In the labyrinth-like spaces, lectures and screenings accompanying the exhibition were also held – a practice that Szegő and his team continue to apply at the Kunsthalle to this day.
One of the most outstanding milestones of Szegő’s curatorial career was the exhibition Álmok Álmodói – Világraszóló Magyarok (Dreamers of Dreams – Hungarians of Global Impact), staged in 2001 at the Millenáris. Across the nearly 13,000 square meters of the Ganz–Millenáris Park, this monumental exhibition presented Hungarian scientific innovation, outstanding inventors of industry and technology, and major figures of art and culture. Preparation took more than two years; 600 scholars and experts and 250 museums participated. Szegő’s key collaborators included Yvette Kovács, Ákos Előd, and György Árvay. In Szegő György’s visual concept, an enlarged neuron network wove itself through every corner of the space. This imagery, symbolizing interdisciplinarity and the sources of creativity, was highly successful with audiences and effectively expressed the birth and interconnections of creativity and innovation across 200 years of Hungarian education. The exhibition remained open for a full year, until the end of 2002, and was seen by nearly 600,000 visitors – most of them schoolchildren and students.
For Szegő, another intellectually challenging task was the curation of the exhibition Új Atlantisz felé (Toward a New Atlantis) in 2000, which represented Hungary at the 7th Venice Architecture Biennale in the renewed pavilion designed by Géza Maróti. He was invited to take on the role of co-curator by János Gerle, the exhibition’s chief commissioner. Around this time, Szegő also began working on an exhibition devoted to Maróti Géza’s life work at the Museum of Applied Arts, and from the Hungarian Museum of Architecture there surfaced the forgotten manuscript titled Mi vagyunk Atlantisz (We Are Atlantis), which became a key element of the exhibition’s concept.
The Biennale’s motto was the exhortation “Less aesthetics, more ethics!” The guiding idea of the exhibition drew a parallel between the present age and the destruction of Atlantis, calling attention – as an exclamation mark – to the self-destructive behaviour of our era’s globally overproductive civilization. In front of the pavilion, a large-scale model of Atlantis was also displayed. As an analogical counterpoint, a walk-in model of the Santo Stefano Rotondo stood in the interior space. In the courtyard, Imre Makovecz’s model–sculpture Múltbeli / Jövőbeli épületek és tájak (Past / Future Buildings and Landscapes), cast in a copper alloy, was installed; it was inspired by the early 20th-century macro-photographs of plant sprouts by the photographer Karl Blossfeldt.
Through the collaboration of multiple genres and the participation of the youngest generation of architects, the Atlantean–Hungarian pavilion conveyed a message that remains valid for 21st-century architecture to this day. In recognition of his work as a theatre and exhibition scenographer, as well as his activity as an art critic and cultural public intellectual, Szegő was awarded the Artist of Merit Prize on March 15, 2002.
The most significant phase of Szegő’s curatorial career began in 2014 with his appointment as artistic director of the Kunsthalle. A new era commenced in the life of the institution. Compared to its previous mode of operation, a complete paradigm shift took place, which Szegő articulated in his artistic-directorial concept for the Műcsarnok. He relaunched the institution of the National Salons, which, alternating annually, offer survey-type presentations of the genres of visual culture. Thus, in a five-year cycle, architecture, fine art, photography, applied and design arts, and folk art follow one another.
The dress rehearsal for this new direction was the First National Architecture Salon, which Szegő began preparing even before his official appointment as director, acting as guest curator and scenographer. On the exhibition design and the architects’ memorial column he worked together with Bálint Botzheim. The Salon achieved enormous success and validated Szegő’s concept: the Kunsthalle belongs to everyone. Its aim is no longer to address only a narrow artistic scene, but to become a house open to the widest possible audience – non-professionals, everyday visitors – offering experiences that make the Kunsthalle attractive, accessible, and culture itself approachable and lovable for all. Szegő’s longer-term goal is to place visual culture in a stronger position, while also integrating the Kunsthalle into the tourism sector. At the same time, through its catalogues, conferences, scholarly lectures, professional and exclusive guided tours, and the now ten-volume Műcsarnok.hu theoretical book series, the institution continues its previously established role as a meeting place for the art-historical profession.
From 2017 onward, the Kunsthalle has been the main venue for the Budapest Photo Festival. From that point on, year after year, world-renowned figures have arrived, such as Alex Webb, Sandro Miller together with John Malkovich, Martin Parr, Jan Saudek, and David Lynch. The photo festival has brought peak visitor numbers to the Kunsthalle year after year. Alongside the classical fine arts, several emblematic photography exhibitions proved revelatory, such as those by Sebastião Salgado and Imre Benkő. The exhibitions are characterized by an extraordinarily broad range of genres combined with high frequency – 20 to 24 exhibitions annually. During Szegő’s directorship, the Kunsthalle has provided exhibition space for a wide spectrum of Hungarian and international artists.
In recognition of György Szegő’s multifaceted body of work and his role in advancing the broad social recognition of architecture and the architectural profession, he was awarded the Miklós Ybl Prize in 2014, and for his theatrical, journalistic, and exhibition-organizing activities he received the Outstanding Artist Award in 2016.
[2024]