5. Arts and cultural education
Hungary
Last update: November, 2021
The arts have traditionally had an important position in Hungarian public education. Literature – known simply as “Hungarian” – is taught in a relatively high number of weekly hours, thanks to the role that mother-tongue literature played in the historical process of constructing national identity. The strong personal influence of Zoltán Kodály, composer and reformer of music education, led in the 1950s to frequent singing classes in the lower grades, which still prevails.
Education in art and music in Hungary is available at elementary, secondary, and tertiary level schools. Institutions of basic education in art and music are accessible all over the country. At the secondary level there are 47 schools. Higher level professional art education and training have a long-standing tradition: the University of Fine Arts was established in 1871, and the Franz Liszt University of Music, one of the most prestigious music universities around the world, was founded in 1875 (with the personal involvement of Liszt).
Last update: November, 2021
The latest curriculum of 2012 defines key competences, development fields and educational objectives. None of the development fields is related directly to art education. One of the nine key competences is aesthetic / artistic awareness and expression (in accordance with EU recommendations).
Table 7: Recommended amounts of lessons (in %) per education fields, National Curricula, 2012
| Education Fields | 1-4th grade | 5-6th grade | 7-8th grade | 9-10th grade | 11-12th grade |
| Hungarian Language and Literature | 27-40 | 15-22 | 10-15 | 10-15 | 10 |
| Foreign Languages | 2-6 | 10-18 | 10-15 | 12-20 | 13 |
| Mathematics | 13-20 | 13-18 | 10-15 | 10-15 | 10 |
| Society | 4-8 | 6-10 | 10-15 | 8-15 | 10 |
| Nature | 4-8 | 6-10 | 15-20 | 15-20 | 10 |
| Environmental Studies | - | 2-4 | 4-8 | 5-8 | - |
| Arts | 14-20 | 10-16 | 8-15 | 8-15 | 6 |
| Informatics | 2-5 | 4-8 | 4-8 | 4-8 | 4 |
| Lifestyle | 4-8 | 4-10 | 4-10 | 4-8 | - |
| Sport | 20-25 | 20-25 | 15-20 | 14-20 | 15 |
A minimum of two weekly "Singing and music" lessons and one "Drawing" lesson are included in the curriculum of primary and secondary schools.
Table 8: Number of pupils and pupil/teacher ratios in basic art schools in 2020
| Field / Domain | Pupils | Pupils per teacher |
| Classical music | 70 800 | 6.3 |
| Folk music | 6 000 | 9.0 |
| Jazz | 900 | 7.3 |
| Electro-acoustic music | 2 200 | 7.1 |
| Dance | 59 100 | 37.8 |
| Visual arts and crafts | 31 000 | 26.9 |
| Theatre | 9 300 | 13.5 |
Last update: November, 2021
In the 2020/2021 academic year, the 6 737 students in the arts represented 2.7% of all enrolled at tertiary education. At BA level, students can choose from 19 higher educational programmes, while at MA level, 45 are available. These include 8 educational programmes – e.g., acting and painting –that stayed in their old one-tier system apart from the majority within the Bologna system
The latest development was introduced in chapter 2.1: three out of the five art universities have been transformed into nominally autonomous “public interest foundations”:
- Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design
- The Hungarian Dance University
- University of Theatre and Film Arts(SZFE)
The University of Fine Arts and the Franz Liszt University of Music remained as state institutions.
Last update: November, 2021
One of the functions of the extensive network of the houses of culture is running training courses in various art forms. Participating in various amateur art groups involves continuous training offered by professionals.
Last update: November, 2021
In 2015, a non-profit limited company was founded with the aim of running a Writers’ Academy and related activities, subsidised in the following two years, with a budget of 1 950 000 HUF. The project has since launched and has published works by over a hundred young writers.