On the second day of our Csongrád County tour, we visited Ópusztaszer, the site of the blood-pact, in which the chieftains of the Magyar tribes settled the Capathian Basin, forming the Árpád dynasty in the late 9th century. Today, a national memorial park and museum commemorate the site.
The highlight was definitely the Feszty Panorama, one of the largest paintings in the world! The Feszty Panorama is a cyclorama depicting the arrival of the Hungarians to the Carpathian Basin in 895. Painted by Árpád Feszty and his fellow artists in 1894, the panorama is 1,760-m2, and features close to 2,000 persons! Perhaps the coolest part of the cyclorama is where the two-dimensional painting of the rotunda transitions seamlessly into a three-dimensional installation. I accidentally took a photo of part of the exhibition.
I ran around the open-aire ethnographic collection, breathing in the lifestyle of true-to-life 19th-century manner. I got pretty distracted and found myself more engaged by my interaction with the sheep and epic bronzed mustaches of Hungarian leaders...
I think this is the inspiration for Wolverine's adamantium claws... and maybe the inspiration for his chops too...
Pogácsa making was fun... even got my hands in the mix, but these ladies are the masters...
I had an interesting conversation with a master leathersmith, József Csizócki... interesting mainly because he spoke no English and I speak just as little Hungarian... but I was fascinated by his work and he was able to show me some technique and the classic Hungarian motifs of his craft.
And, this sign... at least they tried to translate?
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