Budapest celebrates the 140th birthday of Lajos Tihanyi with a major retrospective that lifts the curtain on the Hungarian master of Expressionism and the avant-garde. Nearly two hundred works trace his path from figurative intensity to sleek abstraction, alongside personal relics that ground the story of a fiercely original painter who forged a visual language in silence. The exhibition unfolds at 1014 Budapest, Szent György Square (Szent György tér) 2, with guided tours running from late December 2025 through January 2026, plus an online walk-through for those joining from home.
What’s on view
Expect a sweeping selection of Tihanyi’s most important paintings and graphics, plus a cache of estate items that rarely surface. Heavyweight portraiture anchors the show: he painted an extraordinary roster of cultural figures, from Hungarian luminaries Lajos Kassák, Lajos Fülep, Endre Ady, Mihály Babits, Józsi Jenő Tersánszky, Dezső Kosztolányi, Pál Pátzay, and György Bölöni to international names like Ivan Goll, Diego Rivera, Tristan Tzara, Marinetti, and Brassaï. Critics have often compared the expressive charge of these portraits to Oskar Kokoschka. In his later years, Tihanyi turned to abstraction with real daring and, in 1932, joined the international Abstraction-Création group, sealing his place in the broader modernist conversation.
The artist behind the color
Tihanyi’s biography is as gripping as his brushwork. He lost his hearing at 11 to meningitis, and his speech was affected; he read lips, navigated society on his terms, and spoke most fully through paint. Without academic training, he built a distinct visual vocabulary that made him a central figure of The Eight (Nyolcak) and one of the most original voices in 20th-century Hungarian art. He spent time in Nagybánya (Baia Mare) as a young man, moved among painters and writers, and fully inhabited the intellectual currents of his day. After emigrating in the winter of 1919, he never returned to Hungary, living in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, and New York before settling back in Paris in the 1930s.
A legacy rediscovered
For decades, Tihanyi’s work reached Hungarian audiences mostly in black-and-white reproductions; color originals were scarce until his estate, via a circuitous route, returned from Paris to the Hungarian National Gallery fifty-five years ago. This show reunites the color and the context, letting viewers track his experiments with form and his fearless handling of hue up close.
Guided tours: dates and details
“Rebel Forms, Bold Colors – The Art of Lajos Tihanyi” (Lázadó formák, merész színek – Tihanyi Lajos művészete) runs with daily guided tours December 27–30, 2025, 11:00–12:00, and continues into 2026 with multiple slots: January 9 (16:00–17:00), January 11 (15:00–16:00), January 17 (15:00–16:00), January 23 (16:00–17:00), January 29 (16:00–17:00), and January 31 (15:00–16:00). Tours last 60 minutes, meet at the information desk, and cap at 17 guests. Participation requires the special exhibition ticket plus a tour program ticket priced at 1,500 HUF (about 1,500 HUF; approximately 4 USD).
Curator spotlight: TIHANYI 140 with Mariann Gergely
On January 15, 2026, 16:00–17:00, curator Mariann Gergely leads a focused walkthrough of the centenary exhibition. This hour traces Tihanyi’s path from personal hardship to artistic clarity, from his early circles in Hungary to his cosmopolitan networks in Berlin and Paris. Tickets: full 7,400 HUF, concession 4,200 HUF. Maximum 17 participants. Meeting point: ground floor, exhibition entrance.
The person behind the palette: with Gergely Barki
On January 16, 2026, 16:00–17:00, art historian Gergely Barki hosts an unconventional tour that threads together the painter’s social life, solitary habits, and exacting honesty with his evolving practice. Despite hearing loss and challenges in speech, Tihanyi was sociable, had many friends and foes, yet lived essentially alone and never formed a lasting partnership. How that private terrain shaped his art becomes the tour’s central question. Tickets: full 7,400 HUF, concession 4,200 HUF. Max 20 guests. Meeting point: ground floor, exhibition entrance. Tickets available online and on-site, first come, first served.
Join from home: online tour
On January 22, 2026, 19:00–20:00, an online guided tour takes place on Zoom to mark the Day of Hungarian Culture. Fee: 1,500 HUF per person. Max 90 participants. After the live session, guests get a full week to roam the virtual exhibition independently—zoom into artworks, read in-gallery materials, and revisit highlights at leisure.
Accessible program with sign language
On January 25, 2026, 15:00–16:00, the exhibition tour is interpreted in sign language to create a shared experience for hearing, hard-of-hearing, and deaf visitors. Entry requires the special exhibition ticket plus a 1,500 HUF tour program ticket. Content is identical, delivered with interpreter support. SINOSZ members join free with advance registration by January 20. Duration 60 minutes, max 17 people, meeting at the information desk.
Key dates in Budapest
Highlights include December 28–30, 2025; January 9, 11, 15–17, 22–23, 25, 29, and 31, 2026—all in Budapest. Beyond the Tihanyi program, the venue’s seasonal calendar ranges from family workshops to architecture walks, Italian-language tours, and artist-led events, from “Building Tour – From the Crypt to the Dome” (Épületséta – Kriptától a kupoláig) and “Recolor It!” (Színezd újra!) to “Embroidered in Concrete – Writer Rita Halász’s Subjective Guided Tour” (Betonba hímezve – Halász Rita író szubjektív tárlatvezetése) and “The Eight – Scheduled Guided Tour” (Nyolcak – Előre meghirdetett tárlatvezetés), signaling a stacked winter season worth bookmarking.
Plan your visit
Tours are 60 minutes; most cap at 17 participants. Meeting points vary by program: either the information desk or the ground-floor exhibition entrance. Organizers reserve the right to change programs and dates, so check availability and book promptly. For inquiries, contact details are listed by the venue. The photo materials are under the copyright protection of the Museum of Fine Arts.
