The Hungarian National Gallery, the country’s largest public collection dedicated to documenting and showcasing the evolution of Hungarian visual art, is heading into 2026 with a busy, family-friendly calendar. Expect permanent and temporary exhibitions, guided tours in multiple languages, themed programs, family days, festivals, and concerts. Kids get their own creative workshops, art-education sessions, and summer camps—all inside one of Budapest’s most atmospheric cultural spaces.
Kids Become Detectives: Color It Again! Workshop
January kicks off with Color It Again!, a hands-on museum workshop for children that turns the gallery into a playful investigation zone. Young sleuths peel back the mysteries surrounding painter Lajos Tihanyi by studying dozens of his works and hunting for hidden details to solve an unfolding riddle. Creative tasks are built into the detective work: children “forge” paintings, build composite sketches, and experiment with photo manipulation. Dates: Jan 7, 14, and 21. Location: Budapest.
Sunny Skies and Quiet Moments
On Jan 8, Look at that, Mom! – Sunny Days takes families through Pictures of Tranquillity, with a special focus on Adolf Fényes (1867–1945), whose sunlit interiors and lyrical market scenes get a fresh look alongside the permanent collection. Location: Budapest.
Lajos Tihanyi at 140: Bold Color, Rebel Form
The headline event of January is a special retrospective honoring the 140th anniversary of Lajos Tihanyi’s birth, on Jan 9, 11, 17, 23, and 25, with guided tours in Budapest. Deaf from childhood, Tihanyi forged color and form out of silence, creating a singular voice in painting without academic training. He developed a striking visual language that made him a leading figure of The Eight and one of 20th-century Hungarian art’s most original artists. Visitors can explore major paintings, graphics, and personal objects, and learn how his disability became an artistic advantage—reshaping modernism in Hungary.
Italian-Language Highlights Tour
On Jan 9, an Italian-language guided tour walks through Hungary’s greatest hits from the Middle Ages to today, with special attention to the 19th and 20th centuries. You might even bump into Dante among the canvases. Location: Budapest.
Adolf Fényes: Light-Filled Worlds
Jan 10 spotlights Adolf Fényes, a sensitive turn-of-the-century painter whose sunlight even warms the humblest interiors. Expect lively, fairy-tale market scenes and quiet moments that hinge as much on everyday life as on grand history. The tour connects rustic courtyards with French Impressionist echoes and draws playful lines between a veranda in Szolnok and Paris. Location: Budapest.
Toddler Time: Snowflake Dance
Bundle up for Tipegők (Toddlers) – Snowflake Dance on Jan 13 and Jan 27, a gentle winter adventure for toddlers. Explore a white-draped forest, search for colors hidden in snow, and sing, tell stories, and dance with the snowflakes. Location: Budapest.
Curators and Historians on Tihanyi
Jan 15 brings two deep dives. First, TIHANYI 140 with curator Mariann Gergely: for decades, Hungarian audiences knew Tihanyi mostly through black-and-white reproductions. His estate, in a dramatic turn, traveled from Paris to the National Gallery fifty-five years ago. Also on Jan 15, Look, Mom! – Silence Speaks explores how Tihanyi’s childhood illness and resulting deafness shaped an exceptional, unmistakable art. On Jan 16, art historian Gergely Barki leads The Person Behind the Palette, an offbeat tour of the Tihanyi 140 exhibition. Location: Budapest.
Make Your Own Abstraction
On Jan 17, Create! – Abstract Experience Painting pairs a gallery walk with a studio session. Meet giants of abstraction—Sean Scully, Judit Reigl, Simon Hantai—then paint your own bold abstract work, playing with geometry or loose, expressive brushwork. Also on Jan 17: Concrete Embroidery, writer and art historian Rita Halász’s subjective guided tour. Location: Budapest.
Nudes at the Turn of the Century
Jan 18 revisits one of art’s oldest subjects: the nude. The tour of the renewed exhibition on 19th–20th-century nude sculpture tracks changing ideals and how artists shaped the timeless human form to match their era. Location: Budapest.
New Year, New Style
On Jan 21, Mental Fitness – New Year, New Style looks at artists who reinvented themselves. János Vaszary, József Rippl-Rónai, and Aurél Bernáth all explored multiple styles—some works barely seem by the same hand. After a gallery walk, the studio turns to practice, trying on one of Rippl-Rónai’s styles. Location: Budapest.
Online Access, Talks, and Kids’ Adventures
Jan 22 offers an online guided tour of the Tihanyi exhibition for the Day of Hungarian Culture—perfect from home. On Jan 24, Gergely Barki lectures on Doubles and Gaps in Lajos Tihanyi’s Oeuvre, tracing twin works and missing links. Also on Jan 24: Adventure in the Gallery – Strange Faces, with guided tours for 6–9-year-olds (10:30–11:15) and 10–13-year-olds (11:30–12:15). Location: Budapest.
Accessible Tours
On Jan 25, the Tihanyi retrospective includes a sign-language-interpreted, barrier-free guided tour, keeping the deeply personal story of a deaf artist accessible to all. Location: Budapest.
