I think when your only exposure to communism is Jame Bond movies, the Hunt for Red and October, and maybe 1984 you sort of have this "not as bad as it really was" image of communism. I mean yeah all those things paint it in a negative light, but it sort of glamorizes it too. So Budapest was very much included in the ol' communist days of yesteryear. From what I hear it was pretty mild in Hungary, but still very much not capitalist and free. Not very glamorous at all. In fact once it all fell apart (or did it) they removed all the propaganda and art that remained from the communist era. Now there is nothing communist in the city, but 2 years after the last soviet soldier left Hungary they opened up a park on the outskirts of town (at least 2 bus rides) that displays some of the ol' communist side of Hungary. I'd like to think it was symbolic that they removed everything and threw it out of town. I wasn't sure I would have time to see it, but during my last day I found some time to run out there. I really like communist art, not communism, but their art is nice. Very iconic and epic with lots of hard edges and usually a lot of red, my favorite color. Here are some of my favorites from the park beginning with their central garden.
Not sure what that says. Something about crotch stains being good for the mother country. Anyway here is one of the most impressive and stoic statues there. It could almost be a Civil War statue and no one would tell the difference.
And some more.
That one is a bit ominous.
And there were plenty of famous communists there like Lenin.
And Marx.
Stalin can't be far behind right? They actually only had 1 Stalin statue in Budapest and during the 1956 Hungarian revolution it was torn down (it must have looked very similar to that statue of Sadam coming down what with the mustache and all) and all that remained were Stalin's huge boots.
This giant soldier used to be on the "Liberty Hill" that I showed pictures of. It would really give the city a much different feel if that was the still up there overlooking the city.
But this big guy was really the center of attention at the Memorial Park. It has everything that I like about communist art except the color red. If I were to only sculpt one statue in my life and this was it, I would be happy (unless it was for actual communism).
I am glad that I made it out there. I was only there for a short while, but I enjoyed it. I picked up some souvenir Che Guevara socks (he was born in my mission home of Rosario and communism doesn't get much more iconic and epic than him) and also a copy of this poster.
I hung it in my work cubicle because graduate school is a lot like communism and the Hungarians are glad to be done with graduate school. It totally keeps me on task...for the greater good.
3 comments:
we need some communist art in america. maybe we could install communism just long enough to get some good art. then think how exciting it would be to get rid of it.
Yeah, I can’t help but like a lot of Communist art as well. I especially like the logos and symbols. There’re so expressive. But that one of the two hands enveloping the world is pretty scary. I’m glad that didn’t happen; or at least not yet anyway. By the way TNT did a mini-series called The Company that was a fictionalized history of the CIA. It includes a very good section on the failed Hungarian Revolution. Also Michael Keaton gives a really cool performance as ‘spy hunter’ James Jesus Angleton.
We do have a statue of Lenin here in Seattle for some reason. Its pretty good too. He's pulling a wagon and there may or may not be an explosion behind him.
Michael Keaton would make a good spy. He could basically use all his Bruce Wayne lines and it would be perfect. "Y'see, my life is really...complex."
Post a Comment