Chinese warriors to come to Budapest’s Museum of Fine Arts soon

In the next six months, Budapest’s Museum of Fine Arts will feature exhibitions on China’s terracotta army and the works of William Blake, while the Hungarian National Gallery will showcase pieces by Adolf Fényes and Lajos Tihanyi.

Chinese warriors on display in Budapest

László Baán, Director General of the Museum of Fine Arts and its affiliated institutions, outlined the museum’s upcoming highlights during a press briefing on Monday. He emphasised the highly anticipated exhibition Guardians of Eternity – The Terracotta Army of the First Emperor of China, which opens on 27 November and runs through May.

• Museum of Fine Arts to show Chinese terracotta army, Blake, Master MS

“This exhibition, showcasing one of the world’s most spectacular archaeological discoveries, traces the rise of the Qin Empire from the 8th to the 3rd century BCE, featuring key ceremonial artefacts and symbols of the era,” said Baán.

The exhibit will display more than 150 ancient artefacts, including ten original life-sized terracotta soldiers from the first emperor’s clay army, discovered in 1974 by farmers digging a well near the tomb site. Running parallel to this, the Hopp Ferenc Asian Art Museum will host a companion exhibit exploring the Asian Huns, also known as the Xiongnu.

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William Blake, Adolf Fényes, Georg Baselitz

Titled The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, the Museum of Fine Arts will premiere the artwork of William Blake (1757–1827)—also revered as a poet—to Hungarian audiences starting September 26, in collaboration with London’s Tate Museum.

The exhibit, open until January 11, 2026, will also highlight artists who inspired or were contemporary to Blake, including Henry Fuseli, Benjamin West, John Hamilton Mortimer, and J.M.W. Turner, as well as the influence of Blake’s spiritual and visual themes on Hungarian figures such as Antal Szerb and Lőrinc Szabó.

Baán announced that starting mid-October, the museum will present forty contemporary works recently acquired through donations from its Patron Circle. Additionally, from 11 December through 15 March 2026, visitors can see mannerist drawings by Georg Baselitz, one of today’s leading artists.

At the Hungarian National Gallery, a member institution, an exhibition marking the 80th anniversary of Adolf Fényes’ birth will open on 10 October, followed by a comprehensive retrospective of Lajos Tihanyi’s career launching on 20 November.

Public procurement makes no sense when buying art

The director also noted that the State Audit Office (ÁSZ) flagged seven of the thousands of procurements made by the museum between 2019 and 2024 as allegedly noncompliant with public procurement laws and has submitted the matter to the Public Procurement Arbitration Board.

“While we don’t dispute that seven artworks were purchased outside of formal procurement procedures, applying the EU regulation—mandated under national law—is absurd in the art world,” Baán argued. He said he plans to request that Hungarian authorities push for revisions to the EU directive concerning art acquisitions.

Under the EU directive in effect since 2014, museums must conduct a formal procurement process for individual art purchases exceeding EUR 220,000.

“International museum professionals routinely ignore this rule, because the art market operates in complete opposition to procurement logic: it’s not sellers but buyers who compete for unique works of art.”

Baán proposed redefining the regulation to exempt art acquisitions (just like real estate) from the procurement process, regardless of value. He added that adhering to the current rules above the price threshold leads to a slow, bureaucratic process that simulates a competition which doesn’t actually exist. “It’s not a competitive bidding; it’s a negotiation,” he stated.

Other European museums don’t apply it either

He pointed out that not just the Museum of Fine Arts, but major museums across Europe, which conduct substantial public art purchases annually, have not carried out a single public procurement procedure for art over the past decade. This includes institutions known for their regulatory compliance and significant funding sources in Germany, France, the Netherlands, and Scandinavia.

According to Baán, Western European museums avoid penalties because their local authorities consider the directive impractical and choose not to enforce it.

He added that in the past five years, the Museum of Fine Arts has expanded its collection by nearly 1,000 pieces through purchases and another 1,800 items through donations, valued at more than HUF 4.5 billion.

Fines expected

The State Audit Office took issue with the acquisition of seven artworks, including pieces by El Greco, Béla Kádár, and Pál Szinyei Merse, as well as Virgin Mary sculptures by Italian brothers Lorenzo and Angelo Di Mariano, and submitted their findings for legal review in June.

“We paid a total of 1.5 to 2 billion forints for the seven works. Among the challenged purchases, El Greco’s Portrait of Saint Aloysius Gonzaga cost about 600 million forints; the others were around 80–100 million each, just over the threshold. The audit report isn’t finalised yet, but we expect a ruling in the coming weeks, likely requiring us to pay a fine,” Baán said.

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