Overwriting a Difficult Past. Built Legacies and the Search for New Identities in Budapest

In recent years, Budapest has witnessed several architectural reconstructions in historically and symbolically charged locations that aim at rebuilding destroyed or never realised prewar projects in the place of postwar built-legacies. This overlapping of demolition and reconstruction represents the direct interplay of two otherwise individually occurring phenomena. [...] The cumulative effect of interventions suggests a significant transformation of the urban built environment that interferes not only with the cityscape but also with the complex relationship of affected communities with history, memory, and identity. Here the question arises whether current developments reflect deeper unresolved issues with the Socialist past and how they can be interpreted as means to establish curated historical continuities. Against this background, this paper elaborates on the interpretation of the aforementioned process as an act of overwriting by focusing on recurrent narratives related to more recent built-legacies at risk. For this, three case studies are investigated: The Hungarian Chamber of Commerce by Béla Pintér (1969-1972, demolished 2017), the MVM building by Csaba Virág (1974-1979, demolished 2020), and the ’Diplomats-House’ by György Jánossy and János Laczkovics (1971-1981, demolished 2022). The idea is to analyse the course of events as well as pertinent statements of scholars, professionals, activists, and politicians who either contested or promoted the valorisation of the postwar built environment. The overall aim is to shed light on the criticalities of cancelled legacies and explore the role of narratives in shaping the past by actively (re-)building the present.

Quest’articolo studia il nesso tra patrimonio cancellato e rinnovamento urbano attraverso i mo- numenti prebellici ricostruiti in sostituzione degli edifici del dopoguerra a Budapest. La trasfor- mazione urbana è interpretata come sovrascrizione del passato. L’analisi cerca di raccogliere le narrative di rilievo basate su tre casi studi legati al dibatito internazionale e l’attivismo locale. L’obiettivo è di mettere in luce le questioni irrisolte con il passato socialista e l’impatto sul presente.