Szőnyi István Circle of Friends Association

There are countrysides, landscapes and towns that have a special attraction. Inexplicable forces might make you return to the place where you have already been touched by the „genius loci”. You must go back, again and again and, should it be impossible, the memory might grow into a myth. Zebegény has become a myth like that in several people’s minds.

Thinking back of the famous discoverers of Zebegény - the important artists and writers, i.e. Géza Maróti, József Bartóky, István Szőnyi and his artist friends, who moved here at the beginning of the 1900s -, we, the late posteriors, also feel a certain emotion on arriving at the place or just hearing its name.

In 1967 István Szőnyi’s house and garden became a museum. Owing to the first director, Kornél Dániel, the institution has been more than an average memorial museum since the very moment of its foundation. Kornél Dániel could recognise the value of the artist’s heritage as well as the advantages of the place, and also understood the social demand for new forms of culture appearing at the end of the 1960s and at the beginning of the 1970s. Moreover, he managed to win some prominent artists over to the cause so the fine art summer school could be realised in the Szőnyi-garden in 1968. One year later they founded Friends of Szőnyi István Memorial Museum, which became a non-profit company in 2007. The Friends of Museum has continuously run Szőnyi István Summer School, the Youth Art Colony established two decades later, art and craft courses, open-air schools and cultural programs.

The Szőnyi Museum together with the Association working in its garden is an unparalleled cultural unit in Hungary. The main mission of museums has changed by now. Apart from collecting and preserving values they should become a place where passing time stops, the visitor can step out of their daily routine for a short time, can learn and fill up and can find experiences that they cannot get anywhere else. Those who come to any of the summer schools or courses run in Szőnyi István Memorial Museum and Szőnyi-garden can get this kind of experience!

We offer our summer school, art and craft courses to anyone who would like to get a wider access to the world of art. We also welcome teachers and students who are seeking beautiful countryside, inexpensive accomodation and good programs for their school trips!

Szőnyi István Circle of Friends Association
2627 Zebegény, Bartóky út 7.
Tel: +36 27 373 357, Fax: +36 27 370 104, 06 30 2195659

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