National Style in Europe

Text: Ilona Sármány-Parsons

Antonín Wiehl: Building in Park Street, Prague, 1882

The attempts made by Ödön Lechner to create a genuinely Hungarian architectural style has been the topic of heated theoretical debates for over a century now. It encourages each generation to try to realize Lechner’s dream from time to time, but in turn, these efforts tend to generate heated political debates. The idea of creating a national style was not a unique ambition typical of Hungarian artists in the long period spanning over the 19th century, or even after that era. Almost every European nations’ architects and artists shared the desire to establish their own styles which is fairly independent and characteristic of their own nation. Since the culture of the minor nations in Europe has evolved into a favourite topic of international academic research, Lechner’s artistically excellent and outstanding oeuvre has advanced into one of the most frequently referred to and classic examples to demonstrate the expression of nationalism in architecture in British and American specialist literature. The study below, however, draws attention to the fact that Lechner was a modern artist and outlines his oeuvre within its contemporary context whilst emphasizing that Lechner’s intentions were not unique at all, whereas his oeuvre was actually unprecedented and unrepeatable.