Balassi Institute organising programmes worldwide to popularise the Hungarian culture

The foreign ministry’s Balassi Institute network is organising numerous cultural, scholarly and educational events worldwide, Judit Hammerstein, head of the institute told the press on Wednesday.

The Hungarian season in Poland has just ended with the conclusion of an exhibition on Hungarian modernism in the Warsaw Royal Palace. The season featured 550 exhibitions, concerts, theatre and dance performances, fashion shows and other programmes, and has attracted some 1.5 million visitors, Hammerstein said.

The Balassi Institute supervises 24 Hungarian institutes in 22 countries, which have already prepared their summer programmes, she said.

Hungary is the current president of the Visegrád Group, so joint projects with Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland have prominent places among those events, she said.

The Uránia cinema in Budapest is holding a V4 film festival from Feb. 14 to 17, Hammerstein noted. A Hungarian Film Week will be held in Bucharest from Feb. 12, and “Huniwood”, the Hungarian film festival in Berlin, will take place for the 3rd time, Hammerstein said. Hungarian films also will be shown in Spain too.

Puppet artist Géza Blattner will be the subject of an exhibition in Paris, and works by painters Vilmos Aba-Novák, István Szőnyi and Pál Molnár C are showing in Rome. József Rippl-Rónai’s works will be exhibited in Zagreb, she said.

Hungary will be the guest of honour at the Zagreb book festival and participate at book fairs in Leipzig, Bologna, Frankfurt, Seoul and Bratislava, Hammerstein said.

Source: MTI