Budapest National Museum: Museum director fired over LGBTQ content

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Visitors to the National Museum look at paintings by Hannah Reyes Morales: Ironic thanks

Photo: Janos Kummer / Getty Images

The Hungarian government dismissed the director of the National Museum on Monday. The museum's management had been accused of allowing under-18s to visit a World Press Photo exhibit featuring LGBTQ content.

The offending photos document a community of elderly LGBTQ+ people in the Philippines who have lived in a shared home for decades and cared for each other in old age. The judges of the World Press Photo Awards had praised this photo story for its portrayal of the warmth, joy and dignity that emanates from the shared apartment.

Tensions over the exhibition arose last month when the far-right party Mi Hazank ("Our Homeland") filed a complaint with the government. It had referred to a law passed in 2021 that prohibits the depiction and advertising of homosexuality in books and films accessible to minors.

According to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's government, the law is intended to protect minors. 15 countries of the European Union have taken legal action against it. The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, called the law a "disgrace".

After the complaint, the museum posted a message on its website calling on under-18s not to visit the exhibition. At the same time, however, the museum management emphasized that it had no right to ask visitors for their IDs in order to determine their age.

The Minister of Culture announced on Monday that Laszlo Simon, the director of the Hungarian National Museum, had been dismissed. He had not fulfilled the "legal requirements for the institution".

Simon confirmed the expulsion in a Facebook post. However, he denied that the museum had deliberately violated any laws. The museum had indicated the age limit "without delay" on its website. The Ministry of Culture and the government spokesman did not respond to inquiries from international news agencies.

The ousted museum director, himself a former member of parliament for Orbán's right-wing populist party Fidesz, had ironically thanked the "Our Homeland" party in an earlier Facebook message for promoting the World Press Photo exhibition. Long queues had formed in front of the museum over the weekend.

Laszlo Simon had come into office in 2021, he had a five-year contract. He wrote that he took note of the decision of the Ministry of Culture, "but I cannot accept it." As a father of four and as a grandfather, "I strongly reject the idea that our children need to be protected from me or any institution I lead."

Previously, Hungarian booksellers had to pay a fine for selling books with homosexual depictions – without them being wrapped in opaque foil, as stipulated by the "Child Protection Act".

feb/AP/Reuters