Introduction by Balasz Toruk, CITIES partner

One of the principal reasons for Danube-Pilis’ participation in CITIES is to raise awareness that we’re part of the 13  muncipalities “Danube ribbon”. We’re participating in CITIES because we hope that we can align creativity and culture to our plans - to help cooperation between local governments and inhabitants of the 13 municipalities.

Piroska Rakoczi, Creative Industries Expert
A short history lesson...
Like in all the Soviet satellite nations, the dominant artistic style in Hungary during the post war years was Socialist Realism. An excellent example of this work is 1950 painting The Whistling Conductress by Gáspár Felekiné (1902-1992). During communist times art work was either tolerated, prohibited or supported. Art had to support the socialist system. This ended with the creation of the Hungarian Republic in 1990.

After this date artists were faced with a culture when they felt that everything was free. They searched for different ways to express this freedom. They had to decide what subculture they wanted to be part of. Work of this period reflected this search.

As this lecture is about creativity as well as art, we would like to present some ideas that come from Hungarian creativity:

One of greatest designers of Jeans Club is Hungarian.

Prezi.Com (online presentations - like Keynote and PowerPoint) is Hungarian. The creators of Prezi’s process is typically Hungarian - they had the idea, created it, tested it, but they lacked the capital to make it a world-wide innovation and to prosper from their innovation. Consequently, they sold the company and the profit is made by foreign investors.

The font used in one of the stadia for the FIFA World Cup were created by Hungarian graphic designer.

Scientific creativity is as important as artistic. For instance, the Scientists on Mars competition for university students. To do this, a computer simulation of Mars was created, with objects inhabiting the planet. The university students had to find the objects. The first team to win the competition made big steps towards making a satellite. This was modelled in a virtual space, as part of this project, and is now a real satellite.

“Maybe it’s a Hungarian trait to not have the stamina to convert creativity into financial success.”

Lot of new and great initiatives but also Hungarians also tend to be pessimistic. “We have the most pessimistic national anthem in the world”. However, another Hungarian trait is that if someone has a job they usually have 3.

Piroska has created her own example of Hungarian creativity on Twitter
Consumable soda water created by a Hungarian
John von Neumann, computer pioneer was Hungarian as was Laszlo Biro - inventor of the ballpoint pen and Erno Rubik, The inventor of the Rubik Cube.

Barriers to innovation include factors like the patent process being expensive e.g. to protect one motif of design is expensive costs FT100k (approx. €350). To combat this and develop the full potential of Hungarian creativity we need to create and foster a new generation of arts/cultural managers who can develop the infrastucture around culture.

Hungary have a National Cultural Fund (e.g theatre, museums, applied/fine arts, dance etc.) annual calls for proposals. This helps, but tends to be seen as subsidy as opposed to investment capital