Hungarian State Opera, Budapest, Hungary

The Hungarian State Opera House (Hungarian: Magyar Állami Operaház) is a neo-Renaissance opera house located in central Budapest, on Andrássy út. Originally known as the Hungarian Royal Opera House. The Opera House is not only one of the most significant listed buildings of Budapest but number one institute of opera playing with a 300-year-old history as well as the symbol of Hungarian classical music culture. It is the second largest opera house in Hungary.

The Hungarian State Opera holds its absolute leading position in Hungarian theatrical life: besides the Paris Opera it is one of the greatest centres of integrated arts in the world. The Opera House seats 1,260 people, 1,300 with extra seats, attendance is an average 90%. The average attendance of the Erkel, home of the largest Central-European theatre auditorium is 75%, which means an average viewer number of 1,373 out of a seating area of 1,819 without extra seats. The grand auditorium of the Erkel Theatre with extra seats can hold 1,900 people. With the newly-operational Erkel Theatre the total number of visitors of opera and ballet performances more than doubled in 2013.

Touring groups had performed operas in the city from the early 19th century, but as Legány notes, “a new epoch began after 1835 when part of the Kasa National Opera and Theatrical Troupe arrived in Buda”. They took over the Castle Theatre and, in 1835, were joined by another part of the troupe, after which performances of operas were given under conductor Ferenc Erkel. By 1837 they had established themselves at the Magyar Színház (Hungarian Theatre) and by 1840, it had become the “Nemzeti Színház” (National Theatre). Upon its completion, the opera section moved into the Hungarian Royal Opera House, with performances quickly gaining a reputation for excellence in a repertory of about 45 to 50 operas and about 130 annual performances.

It is a richly decorated building and is considered one of the architect’s masterpieces. It was built in neo-Renaissance style, with elements of Baroque. Ornamentation includes paintings and sculptures by leading figures of Hungarian art including Bertalan Székely, Mór Than and Károly Lotz. Although in size and capacity it is not among the greatest, in beauty and the quality of acoustics the Budapest Opera House is considered to be amongst the finest opera houses in the world.

The auditorium holds 1,261 people. It is horseshoe-shaped and – according to measurements done in the 1970s by a group of international engineers – has the third best acoustics in Europe after La Scala in Milan and the Palais Garnier in Paris.[citation needed] Although many opera houses have been built since, the Budapest Opera House is still among the best in terms of the acoustics.[citation needed]

In front of the building are statues of Ferenc Erkel and Franz Liszt. Liszt is the best known Hungarian composer. Erkel composed the Hungarian national anthem, and was the first music director of the Opera House; he was also founder of the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra.

Each year the season lasts from September to the end of June and, in addition to opera performances, the House is home to the Hungarian National Ballet.

There are guided tours of the building in six languages (English, German, Spanish, French, Italian and Hungarian) almost every day.

Today, the opera house is home to the Budapest Opera Ball, a society event dating back to 1886.

Architecture:
The Hungarian State Opera House Budapest VI. in the district of Andrássy út nr. (on the former Sugar Road). At the present-day opera house, in a marshy neighborhood, there was a reputable chapel, which for a long time hindered the construction of the new ornate Avenue.

The decoration of the symmetrical façade follows a musical theme. In niches on either side of the main entrance there are figures of two of Hungary’s most prominent composers, Ferenc Erkel and Franz Liszt. Both were sculpted by Alajos Stróbl.

The foyer has marble columns. The vaulted ceiling is covered in murals by Bertalan Székely and Mór Than. They depict the nine Muses.

Wrought-iron lamps illuminate the wide stone staircase and the main entrance. Going to the opera was a great social occasion in the 19th century. A vast, sweeping staircase was an important element of the opera house as it allowed ladies to show off their new gowns.

The main hall is decorated with a bronze chandelier weighing 3050 kg. It illuminates a fresco by Károly Lotz, depicting the Greek gods on Olympus. The central stage proscenium arch employed the most modern technology of the time. It featured a revolving stage and metal hydraulic machinery.

The royal box is located centrally in the three-storey circle. It is decorated with sculptures symbolizing the four operatic voices – soprano, alto, tenor and bass.

The building:
Built-in floor space (without the steps of main and side entrance): 5383.2 square meters;
volume (with sub-street levels): 198 974.42 air meters;
maximum length: 113.22 meters;
maximum width: 59.06 meters;
the highest point of the building is 50.69 meters above the street level;
the stage area is 634.55 square meters (the back stage plus 252.98 square meters);
the highest height of the stage: 48.4 meters (from the bottom of the sink to the bottom of the roof)
the altitude of the stage is 109.85 meters,
above the street level: 5.29 meters.
The Opera House was largely in line with the expectations of the age, but Ybl departed from the theater style considered as a school example, the 1871 Dresden Opera House designed by Gottfried Semper. He was based on the Paris Opera by Charles Garnier, where the main principle was that the auditorium could be approached through a stage staircase located in its axis. This was followed by Ybl as he formed the lobby and the hallway of the stairs. However, she kept the stairwell vertical connection between the halls at the two halls of the lobby, as shown by the Dresden Opera House. Well-equipped theater (back side) and audience traffic (main entrance) were complemented by a representative and distinct approach path with the royal staircase. This leads from the Drum Drum Drive from the Dalszínház Street and from the protocols hall with a single straight arm to the representative rooms on the first floor. However, the length of the building differs from the Dresden and Paris opera houses in that Ybl has covered the auditorium and the rope floor with a common roof structure. The resulting large airspace has enabled the valuable and sensitive ceiling of the auditorium to be protected against moisture and temperature fluctuations.

Interior and exterior decorations:
The construction and painting of the Hungarian Royal Theater was a great opportunity for the artists of the city to demonstrate their talents before the home and abroad audiences. This was not only an art but a political question, as the construction supervisory board sought to work on the construction site only by Hungarians. This was also done in 1878 when it was on the agenda to choose the designer of the interior decoration.

Since the Opera House was the most representative venue for the capital, the committee, with Podmaniczky Frigyes and Miklós Ybl, made the decorations plan with special care. The Hungarian National Fine Arts Society also participated in the evaluation of the sketches. The subject of the topic is unknown, but probably in many ways, Podmaniczky’s word, as he notes in his notes that he defined the mythological themes. The basic idea was probably based on Parisian and Viennese opera houses.

Róbert Scholtz was asked for the interior decorations of the Opera House. Nowadays, only a fraction of the original decorative painting appears, as the casein emulsion used has collapsed in 30-40 years. Repackaging was restored to the original designs. The decorations were renewed several times, so in 1903, 1912, after World War II, but the most significant was the 1984 restoration. The original wall painting remained in the best of the buffet ceiling and the ground floor of the royal staircase. The decoration was made in several stages from 1880 to 1884: at the earliest, the statues were erected and with them the ornamentation at the same time. The painting of the paintings from 1881 until the opening, until September 1884, proceeded simultaneously in several rooms simultaneously.

With the implementation of the interior wall paintings of the Opera House, Than Mór and Károly Lotz, who considered a comprehensive program of Viennese Staatsoper, whose central theme is the glorification of music, its allegorical and philosophical meaning is more comprehensive and thoughtful. The program’s basic idea was influenced by Nietzsche’s cultural philosophical and aesthetic study published in 1871, Die Geburt der Tragödie, in which the philosopher argues that the opposite of the human essence rooted in antiquity, the human being’s apollonial humanism and the dionysian instinctive life, are also elemental, or damaging effect.

The facade:
In the design of the facade, Miklós Ybl was assisted by Albert Schickedanz and Henrik Schmal, architect of the Opera House. The most striking feature of the facade is the Egyptian Sphinx of Alajos Stróbl, carved from Carrara marble, beside the side entrances, between their claws mask and laurel wreath. Beside the main entrance there is a large statue of Ferenc Liszt and Ferenc Erkel. They were also carved out of Stróbl. Above them, at the corners of the jungle terrace, there are two bronze pockets on the fly holding light fixtures. There are four workshops on the two sides of the arcades before the foyer’s windows: Erató and Terpszikhoré (both made by Viennese Leo Fessler), Thaleia (works by Gyula Donáth) and Melpomené (Béla Brestyánszky).

The facade is crowned by a Balustradian main curtain, sixteen composers originally built in limestone with today’s limestone sculpture: the work of Donáth Gyula was made by Arezzói Guidó, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi and Orlande de Lassus; György Kis created the statue of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Jacopo Peri and Béla Brestyánszky formed the figure of Carl Maria von Weber, Gioacchino Rossini and Jean-Baptiste Lully; Gyula Szász Christoph Willibald Gluck, Giacomo Meyerbeert and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; Alajos Stróbl won the figure of Luigi Cherubini and Gaspare Spontini; Hussar Adolf Ludwig van Beethoven, Joseph Haydn and Richard Wagner. The original sculptures were decadent in the 1930s, and to avoid accidents, the rest were removed. Their replacement did not take place until 1965, then exchanges took place. Today the following sculptures are visible (from left to right): Claudio Monteverdi (József Ispánki), Alessandro Scarlatti and Christoph Willibald Gluck (Dezső Győry), Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven (László Marton), Gioacchino Rossini and Gaetano Donizetti (Tar István) Mihail Ivanovics Glinka and Richard Wagner (Sándor Mikus), Giuseppe Verdi and Charles Gounod (Pál Pátzay), Georges Bizet and Mogyeszt Petrovics Muszorgszkij (Sandor Váradi), Pjotr Iljics Tchaikovsky and Stanisław Moniuszko (Károly Antal) and Bedřich Smetana (József Ispánki) .

Over the semicircular openings of the gallery in front of the foyer, a large baroque style statue basket symbolizes the building’s function. On the Dalszínház street, Pan, Dionysus, Poszeidón and Hermész, Hajós Street, Orpheus, a bacchanan, a gymnastics and a satirist playing on a piano. In the middle of the instrumental music, soul, triumphal music, news, inspiration inspired by poetry and allegorical statues depicting the power of poetry.

The colorful majolica decoration of the facade was created by William Marschenke. He covered the arches with hexagonal cartridges, and on the other hand, he formed a cab, with flower-pegs intertwined with trousers and instruments with contralateral axes, repeated at every balcony door. In the depressions of the majolica cubes, a huge shell is formed, above it is a reed-wrought faun head, and in the middle there are giant vases, decorated with garlands and garlands.

The triple arch of the driveway and the gray-black and white-colored sgraffiti (sketched decorations) on the upper floors are from the workshop of Rolbert Scholtz. The carriage is decorated with four large lamp posts. The outskirts of the side facades made of limestone are decorated with sgraffiti like the main entrance.

The lobby:
The color of the lobby is characterized by different colors of noble marbles, bright liver-colored walls, dark gray-white columns, white-headed and pedestrian black and gray-grained columns. The material was taken from Italy and its work was done by Béla Seenger, famous architect of Pest. The splendor of the lobby is partly due to its gilded donga. The floor is covered with a black and white mosaic made by Italian Luigi Depel. There are huge bronze basins on both sides of the lobby, decorated with their heads.

The decor of the lobby follows the main idea of the main facade: the representation of the connection between European and Hungarian music. The four circular reliefs above the entrance represent the portrait of four famous composers: Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Mihály Mosonyi, Ferenc Doppler, Károly Goldmark. These were made by Antal Szécsi. The main entrance is decorated with a gilded lant. Against him, a white marble door leads to the cloakroom.

Bertalan Székely painted the nine mujaces in the gilded frame cassettes of the lobby. Mosaics accompanying Apollo, the inspiration of the arts and sciences who sing to the Olympus to sing gods. The four- and octagonal cassettes that provide the frame of the muses accompany them in T-shaped boxes. The figures are surrounded by strong blue backgrounds and rugged draperies.

The decoration staircase:
The walls of the ornamental staircase are accompanied by marble staircases, renaissance reliefs. The oak-brown stucco wall above the first floor was as colored as the parts below. The painting on the dyed marble is covered with lacquer, which causes the difference. The training of the artillery was carried out by Péter Fink and his company.

The center of the staircase is the portrait of Ferenc Erkel, created by Alajos Stróbl, placed on the third floor before the marble wall. Below it is a portrait of Ferenc Liszt. On the first floor on the right, Telcs Ede Ybl Miklós marble bust, left on the left by Lajos Petri made by Erzsi Sándor statue.

Abutments above the windows are depicted on the putters that hold the laurel wreath of Apollo. These triangular arcades are held by two red marble columns, with their masks in masks. The painted masks are painted in the arc triangles and the gilted stucco fences that surround the ceiling include the names of famous operas, their plaques supported by winged lions. The gallery features three or three renaissance door openings made of white marble, decorated with pewter rails. The drawer of the gallery had an ornamental painting that reminded the ground floor gateway. In the middle a bronze chandelier emphasizes the depth of the space. The chandeliers and armed flame holders are decorated with blue-transparent cobalt glass flowers. The luminaires in the building, except for the large auditorium chandelier, come from the workshop of Mátyás Zellerin.

The glazed mirror ceiling of the staircase is decorated by Than Mór’s paintings, whose theme is the presentation of the awakening and power of music. This Than works in three directions: Orpheus’s music defeats the underworld, the darkness, the forces of death; The song of Amphion prevails in everyday life, in the sphere of human work; By the apollo and the mosaics, pure harmony overwhelms every subtle, wild natural power. Than nine rectangular paintings, painted on a panel, on the mirror ceiling, six lunettes on the upper ribbon, complemented by the four Apollo glittering spouts between the lunettes. On the right side of the ceiling, an intriguing female figure depicts the awakening of Music as it is awakened by the Genius of Poetry on Pegasus. With his hand he relies on the lance of Hermes made of turtle-armor. Ahead of A winged griffin, he runs across Apollo, headed by Apollo, the palm grove Nike, allegorizing the poetry of poetry. On either side of the ceiling, one of the elongated rectangular scenes shows Tólosz’s judgment on a golden background composition. A coherent picture of the chandelier depicts Hera, Dwarf, Zeus and Poszeidón in the form of putters. The four corner compositions show singing and playing chicks. In the lunette of the ribbon, at the beginning of the three-tiered picture line at the left, Orpheus can be seen at the entrance of the underworld, as Kerberos guarding the entrance of the lute’s voice dulls. In the second picture Orpheus’s music fascinates the powers of the underworld and brings up his dead wife, Eurydice from the shadow realm. In the third picture, Orpheus’s death is depicted. The lunettes on the opposite side depict the story of Amphion. First, they are seen in a pasture, where Hermes, her brother, gets the same lame as Apollo. On the middle lunette is the myth of the myth: with his twin brother Zétosszal Théva built the walls of the city. Than the last lunette depicts the twisting of the statue of Amphion. In the stage staircase for Than’s paintings, two lunettes of Lotz Károly join the buffets: the allegory of Architecture and Fine Arts.

A foyer:
The foyer on the first floor is a large, enclosed, dongabate room, rich in gold, with brown-ocher arched walls. There are two entrances from the staircase, which are painted by the paintings of Károly Lotz inside Italian marble columns. The composite-headed columns feature protracted sections embellished with reliefs of harvesting pistols, with four stucco sculptures on them: on the left there is a son-in-law running on a sphinx, and another on a lion’s seat and a lame blade. There are two groups on the right: a mermaid sitting on a mermaid, holding a wine beetle and a catnip-ribbon satiris tiger, with a downy armpit. These are all deliberately created Dionysus symbols that emphasize the purpose of the hall (today’s buffet). The tabloid compositions of the ceiling show Dionysos’s birth and upbringing, and in the midst of the triumphal center. On the middle triumph, the wolf goddess god Ariadne sits on a gilded chariot worn by two tigers. Before them is Eros, surrounded by bacchanas, satyrs. Side walls are decorated by twelve dancing pistols. The compositions of the ceiling and the paintings of the side walls were György Vastagh. The nine paintings of the side walls were made by Árpád Feszty. They represent different sounds: mussels, birdwatching, creeping, nymphs, faun’s music, storm suffocation, Sappho’s music, echoes, twigs.

The foyer is part of the smoker. Its oak paneling was designed by Miklós Ybl, as well as most of the carpentry work of the Opera House, by Ödön and Marcell Neuschloss, and by Endre Thék. The oak panel is complemented by a damask trim. These once famous Pest carpets were made by Kramer, Hoffmann and Kozilek, but they were destroyed in time and replaced in 1984.

Audience:
The auditorium is made up of horseshoe shaped four-tier darts. It differs from the original to the fact that the electric lighting was introduced instead of the former air in 1895, and in the 1950s the gold-green velvet curtain was replaced by cherry-wood in line with the color of the lounges and lodges and the chandelier was three meters above it, into the auditorium. The other architectural and decorative elements are the original that Miklós Ybl defined.

The halls are decorated with gilded parapets and umbrellas. The ground floor front guard is tiny masks and pelicans, butters on the first floor masks, second-floor instruments with instruments, and the third floor countertops are decorated with operas. The jambs are decorated with gilded zinc casting grotesque figures made by Alajos Stróbl. On the floor of the third floor, cast gold plated ornamented with ornamental flower pots are hanging on the bushes. In the center of the halls, on the first floor stands the three-piece royal feast. There are four allegorical sculptures of Gyula Donáth, symbolizing the tenor, the soprano, the alt and the bass. In the arcades above the semicircular openings of the proscenium lodges, there is a gilded stucco room of four cornerstones, the Shadows, the Truth, the Wisdom and the Force. The columns are embellished with embossing motifs for playing puttons.

The dome is kept above the floors by arches resting on Corinthian columns. Their hexagonal fields are decorated with a painting depicting a musical percussion. The painting works of the auditorium were almost entirely done by Károly Lotz. Some works (the allegories above the proscenium and the medals near the medallions) are works by Károly Jakobey.

The triptych of the stage is decorated with the allegorical painting of Music and Dance and surrounded by the music of the music and poetry, surrounded by the genius of Art. Beside the dome, there are also two medallions of gold on which Lotz describes the Light and Glory with a Pegasus and a flying figure in Gryffin.

The Glorious Music:
The main work of the dome is one of the outstanding creations of Hungarian painting painting, The Glorious Music. The epoch-styled art of history is a sloping truncated cone with a radius of approx. 440 cm, the circumference of the circle is about 45 meters. The circular composition depicts Olimpos: surrounded by twelve mainstream entourage, divided into six groups as they listen to the Apollo’s music between the clouds. The gods are only roughly equivalent to dodecatheon. Apollo, Zeus, Aphrodite faces the realm of Nüx, Dionysus and Poszeidón. These two parts do not break sharply, but flow into each other, mutually muted, rotating in circles. The essence of the composition of the image is the uniform, circular flow that is provided by the decorative line drawing. The figures are painted in a mild peace perspective, they are lower towards the center.

The main form of the composition is the Apollo on the clouds, along with a two-tiered curve along the lines of the moons and the horizons. They fly to Ego (Aurora, Dawn).

In the second group, Zeus, the lord of Olympus, thrusts a triangle as a ridge. Next to it is Hera, the Queen of the gods, and the winged Niké above them glorifies Apollo. At the foot of Zeus, the Trojan horse, Ganëmédész, the goddess of the gods, is behind the other drinker, with the visible couple of Hébé, Héraklés. There are figures of the three great powers of earthquake: Gaia, Demeter and Rheia. The outstanding figure of the group is Pallasz Athéné, the goddess of wisdom, next to the furious Hermes, who plays at the Apollo Concert as the creator of the instrument of music. Below Hephaistus, a clever blacksmith and a shameless female figure emerge. To the right is the god of war. The gods around Zeus also symbolize the audience of music.

The central figure of the next team is Nüx, the great goddess of the night. He is surrounded by the underworld: Hadhay, the master of the underworld who is destroying Persephone, besides Nüx, two sons, the famous twin pair, Hüpnosz, dream and Thanatosz, death represents the night. Above them an owl holds deep-colored drapery. Legally, there are ceremonies surrounded by serpents. Above all, there is also a triple figure: the moiras that work with people’s limbs. Tükhu, the lottery associates with them, in the hands of the wheel of fortune. He faces the Dionysus troop of the Moorish Sunflower, grabbing a flaming torch from a putt.

The next team is grouped around Dionysus. Bacchants, bacchanas, a satyr, a centaur, surrounded by a riding rope (bacchanas), are all sensory representatives. According to the tradition, the odd solution to Lotz’s overwhelmingly veiled female faces is the result that the master was scornful of dying, drunken, female features of passion. Below Dionysus’s educator, the old Silenian, appears in his hand with kantharos, drunk. The team is led by a shaking shutter.

The central figure of the fifth group is in Poszeido, the sea of the sea. Under his feet is a huge aquatic animal with a spit in his hand. Next to him lies his wife, Amphitrite, the caretaker of the sea monsters. There is the whispering Zephyr and the roaring Boreas, the mild and stormy sea breeze. Around them, tritones and wizards, with lantal, twigs, and rattles, with the sparkling music.

The last sixth group is around Aphrodite. Aphrodite looks into a mirror held by a beaver, next to the row of eros and Psycho, and a row of flower-worn spiders. Before the Aphrodite there are three Kharis. One of them supplies the apple of Eris to the goddess. The Kharis – back in the circle – return to the Apollo masculine team.

An important feature of 19th century eclecticism is the contrast between the figures (for example, Pallasz Athéné and Aphrodite, the Muses and Bacchants, Iris and Zephyrus, etc.). It is also up to this style to create three or three divisible groups. The color scheme of the picture is clear, but not blurry, with no excessive contrast. It is based on pastel skies, figurines and ornamental draperies that are all warm in color.

The chandelier:
The grand chandelier in the auditorium was built in Mainz and was installed in the summer of 1884 in the smoke drainage hood in the center of the auditorium ceiling. It holds two steel ropes. With manual winches, it can be lowered to the ground floor, which allows it to be maintained. It takes almost 25 minutes to fully lower it, but it takes twice as much time to lift it as it should be careful not to turn the chandelier around its axis. Originally, there were 500 gas flames that were lit by electric induction. During the performances, it was not possible to completely quench the particulars of the gas illumination, so the viewers watched the show in a dim space. Due to the high heat output, the main one hung three meters down. In 1895 electric lighting was introduced. The luminaires and chandeliers have been reconstructed, built an electrical network and installed network equipment. Until 1980 repairs and modifications were initiated only during the decades under tension, but during the 1980-1984 reconstruction, the chandelier was completely disassembled and refurbished. The old gas tubs were removed from the chandelier body, with a total weight of about 900 kilograms. There are currently 220 light sources in the 2.1-ton chandelier.

Courts of Representation:
In the Opera House special rooms for the ruler were built. From the Dalszínház street, through a separate entrance, you can reach a lobby (with its royal staircase). Its floor is covered with white-yellow-black marble, and its furnishings are decorated with renaissance patterns, made of oak wood. The ornamentation of the ceiling is the most beautiful, the best of which is made by the Scholtz workshop. The vaulted vaults of the arches are decorated by paintings by Mihály Kovács, depicting musical percussion, holding hands with historical instruments or folk music instruments. On the left side of the entrance, the largest composition above the mirror forms a prize distribution.

From the middle of the lobby there is a single-armed staircase under a drawer. At the bottom of the staircase there are two shielded bronze-cast sculptures by Gyula Bezerédi. The upstairs gallery is located at the top of the stairs. The stairs of the stairs are surrounded by a yellow noble marble statue, surrounded by eight elevated white and red marble columns. The staircase above the staircase and the gallery’s ceiling are brightly colored and richly decorated with arabesque. The gallery is also decorated by Gyula Aggházy’s monochrome lunette series under the ceiling, depicting ideal landscapes. Today, there are exhibitions of the Opera House Memorial Museum.

The Royal Salon:
The royal salon is behind the parade. Under the dongabatched ceiling there is a light stucco relief, overlapping surfaces in the ceilings of the ceiling with decorative surfaces, alternating with the scenes of Than Mór’s second mythological series. The two opposite vertical vertical planes show the Dawn and the Night. First, the floating figure of Ego hints the roses, the torchlight splashing in the darkness before him, the Night being seen as Artemis, with one hand in bow, with his other hand leaning back to pull an arrow. The tailed goddess sits on the clouds behind his back lover, the ever-sleeping Enduro.

The three central compositions of the ceiling represent beauty and love. On the left there is a group of three Kharisas (the three cohesive goddess symbolizing the harmony), on the right is Ego and Psychic (their relationship is the symbol of harmony), while in the middle Parisz’s judgment symbolizes pre-beauty worship.

The Székely Hall:
The poster on the left side of the Proscenium Hall is named after Bertalan Székely, who painted the fresco on the floor. The rectangular room can be approached from the royal stairway through a richly decorated oak door that is framed by a carved half-pole in the hall, with its carvings of fruits, flowers and grotesques. In front of the entrance is a wood carved fireplace. On both sides of the fireplace are the sculptural portraits of Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, which are the works of Pál Pátzay. The ceiling is a geometric oak, finely goldened with two historic bronze chandeliers. The main decoration of the hall is Bertalan Székely’s “The Four Seasons”, a picture of the naked putts that surrounds the ceiling.

The first stage of the composition is the world of winter. In the picture above the windows of the room there is a snowy nightclub and a red-blaze fire, a roaring deer, and hunters in the early part of the fire. Over the fireplaces, lazy children playing circular toys, flourishing orgons among the blue spring-spring skyrocketing elements of the Air. On the side of the door leading to the lodge, Székely depicted the summer with the element of water and the déla. Idyllic landscapes show sleeping children, reeds and a pool with ponds, swans, snuffers and melons. The composition over the entrance is Fall, Earth and Dusk. The butters twist the vines, cut the juice from the gallows, surrounded by yellowing foliage. There are no sequences between the ribbons, they are perpetual circuits, they and the end are related to the following periods.

Second theatre:
Today, a secondary building, which has been part of the Hungarian State Opera company since 1951, is the Erkel Theatre (renamed as such in 1953), which originally opened in 1911 as the “Népopera” (The People’s Opera). It was closed in 1915, modernized with seating capacity reduced to 2,400, and reopened in 1917 as the “Városi Színház” (City Theatre). It fulfilled many functions over the years, including being a cinema, until it came under the control of the State Opera House. Significantly renovated in 1961, it functioned as a second venue for the company until 2007 when once again, closure and renovations took place until its reopening in 2013.