The Hungarian National Gallery, the country’s largest public collection tracing the birth and evolution of Hungarian fine art, is rolling out a full February in Budapest. Expect permanent and temporary exhibitions, guided tours in multiple languages, themed programs, family days, festivals, concerts, and a full slate of kids’ workshops—creative clubs, art education sessions, and summer camps included. Much of the month spotlights Lajos Tihanyi’s 140th birthday with special tours, talks, and a major retrospective, alongside fresh looks at the nude in sculpture, the quiet power of Adolf Fényes (Fényes Adolf), and Valentine’s-ready love stories from the collection.
Time-Travel for Kids
February opens with Color It New!—a hands-on museum workshop for children that time-travels through everyday life in earlier centuries. Using paintings, genre scenes, portraits, and old photos, kids peek into the objects people used, how they dressed, what they played with, and what they dreamed of. Inspired by the artworks, they draw, paint, make comics, and craft their own stories. Sessions run February 4, 11, 18, and 25 in Budapest.
The Body Beautiful
Mama, Look! – The Beauty of the Human Body is a guided tour exploring the enduring theme of the nude—how its depiction mirrors shifting ideals of beauty and humanity. Visitors take in the renewed turn-of-the-century exhibition Nude Sculptures from the Turn of the Century. Tours happen February 5 and 12 in Budapest, with an English-language version titled Look at That, Mom! on February 19.
Tihanyi, Restless Charmer
On February 5 in Budapest, art manager Nóra Winkler and art historian Tünde Topor lead a joint tour: Lajos Tihanyi, the Restless Charmer. It anchors a month honoring Tihanyi’s avant-garde path from the cafés of the fin de siècle to Berlin and Paris.
Budapest–Berlin–Paris: Toward Abstraction
Writer and art historian Rita Halász guides Budapest visitors on February 6 through how Tihanyi, born 140 years ago and a defining member of the group The Eight (Nyolcak), moved from figurative compositions to a pure language of color and form. The tour charts influences from the turn-of-the-century café scene to the Berlin avant-garde and Parisian modernism.
Make It: Naked Reality
On February 7, a two-part program in Budapest explores how artists have represented the human body from the 19th century to today. After a gallery walk, participants create artworks using their own body parts as both subject and tool, producing bold body prints.
Rebellious Forms, Bold Colors
The flagship retrospective Rebellious Forms, Bold Colors – The Art of Lajos Tihanyi (Lázadó formák, merész színek – Tihanyi Lajos művészete) puts the artist’s key paintings, graphics, and personal items in the spotlight. Deaf since childhood, Tihanyi forged a singular visual language without academic training, becoming one of the most original figures of The Eight and 20th-century Hungarian painting. Catch guided visits on February 7, 8, 11, 12, and 13 in Budapest, plus an English-language tour on February 13. There’s also a French-language tour, Budapest–Berlin–Paris: L’art de Lajos Tihanyi, on February 8.
Adolf Fényes: Pictures of Silence
Guided tours of Pictures of Silence. Adolf Fényes (1867–1945) (A csend képei. Fényes Adolf) introduce the memorial exhibition and related works in the permanent collection on February 7 and 21, and a curator’s tour with Ágnes Horváth on February 15 in Budapest. An online guided tour on February 10 lets audiences explore Fényes’s painting from home.
From Crypt to Dome
The former Royal Palace that houses the Gallery hides marvels. On February 8 in Budapest, the architectural tour leads visitors through the Habsburg Palatine Crypt, the panorama-rich dome, and other special corners while unpacking the Gallery’s history and collections.
Toddlers and Carnivals
Tipegők – Venetian Carnival on February 10 whisks little ones to Venice for elegant masked balls and parades. Kids hop on a carousel, dance, try on roles, and finish by crafting a glittering carnival mask.
Valentine’s, With Musicians and Muses
February 14 in Budapest is all heart. A Valentine’s tour, The Most Beautiful Hungarian Paintings About Love, follows artists and muses through joyous, passionate, turbulent, and tragic romances, featuring works by Pál Szinyei Merse (Szinyei Merse Pál), János Vaszary (Vaszary János), and Róbert Berény (Berény Róbert). Love Is in the Air offers an English-language spin through the collection’s greatest and most heartbreaking love stories in painting and sculpture. Plus, a musical tour of Tihanyi’s show with Ádám Bősze and Gábor Bellák scores Budapest, Berlin, Paris, and the pulsing first decades of the 20th century. Art historian Gergely Barki adds an encore lecture: Two or None. Doublings and Gaps in Lajos Tihanyi’s Oeuvre.
Family Adventures and Preschoolers
On February 21 in Budapest, Adventure in the Gallery – Carnival Transformation runs guided tours tailored for ages 6–9 (10:30–11:15) and 10–13 (11:30–12:15). On February 24, Preschoolers in the Gallery – So Colorful! introduces how painters worked and what paintings and sculptures reveal, with gallery games followed by studio creation.
Nudes Reframed
Nude Sculptures from the Turn of the Century (Aktszobrok a századfordulóról) returns on February 22 in Budapest with a guided visit to the renewed 19th–20th-century nude sculpture display, tracing how depictions of the nude shift with each era’s ideals.
Mind Fitness: Sculpture Comes Alive
On February 25 in Budapest, the Mind Fitness program asks: Can a sculpture come alive? Can you fall in love with a perfectly crafted work? The tour through the permanent collection and the refreshed turn-of-the-century nude sculpture show explores the electric mix of nudes, love, and mythology, followed by a creative studio session.
Italian Highlights, Dante Included
An Italian-language guided tour on February 13 in Budapest surveys the greatest masterpieces of Hungarian art from the Middle Ages to today, with special focus on the 19th and 20th centuries. You might even run into Dante among the paintings.
One City, Many Languages
Throughout February, Budapest hosts Hungarian, English, French, and Italian tours, ensuring locals, expats, and travelers can plug into a month when the Gallery doubles as classroom, playground, concert hall, and love-story archive—under a dome with a view and above a royal crypt.
