BUDAPEST.- For many years, the museum has organised its annual exhibitions and activities around a theme that reflects the role of museums and contemporary art in the 21st century. In 2024, the links between contemporary art and other art forms and disciplines have been explored, and a strong emphasis has been placed on reaching out to disadvantaged communities. The 2025 exhibition programme has been designed with an unusual focus on diverse artistic practices rather than an overarching theme.

To understand contemporary art, it is important to see the situations and relationships that create the works. The practices presented go beyond traditional frameworks, linking art to society and creating new forms of expression and community experiences.

The exhibition Women’s Quota 02. Women Artists, Creative Women from the Collection of the Ludwig Museum will open on the 23rd of January. The second section of the two-part exhibition presents the genres and themes chosen by women, as well as their artistic achievements and accomplishments over the past fifty years, through their works in the museum.

Inspired by museum pedagogy, Frequently Asked Questions – FAQ addresses the process of reception itself: it poses fundamental questions about the nature, place and role of art in our lives. It aims to promote sharing and mediation through a variety of methods and playful forms.

From mid-March, the Y-Profile exhibition will showcase works by young artists from the contemporary collection of the National Bank of Hungary.

One of the most important exhibitions of the year is In a Field Well-Found – Artistic Practices from the Marcel Duchamp Prize’s 25 Years, which will present the diverse creative strategies of artists who have won the prestigious French award, working in different cultural and institutional contexts.

In a break with tradition, the exhibition of shortlisted works from the Esterházy Art Award for young artists will be on show from the beginning of June. The increasingly prestigious bi-annual event aims to put young artists in the spotlight and introduce this generation’s vision of art and their different practices.

The autumn season will start with Bing Bang. Expanding Collection Horizons, a brand-new major exhibition selected from the Ludwig Museum’s collection, which traces the evolution of the museum’s collection through the distribution of its acquisitions over time. This overview, from its founding to the present day, can be seen as a kind of self-reflection on the history, development, potential and aims of collecting.

Also on display from September is Beautiful Contemporary Connections, a project of the children’s foundation Világszép Alapítvány. The anniversary project brings together 25 artists and over 50 young people in state care, creating opportunities for human and artistic connections.

The exhibition Golden Repair – Finom Illesztések is a continuation of a long-term curatorial venture, which explores the themes of healing and repair in a broad sense, including social, ecological, physical and psychological processes. 

The exhibition Before the Storm – Taiwan, on the Border between Past and Future focuses on current trends and works that showcase Taiwan’s scientific and technological development, as well as the historical and socio-political context that has shaped Taiwan’s unique identity and its dynamic, open society today.

This year, the Hungarian Pavilion’s exhibition at the Venice International Architecture Biennale is not about architecture, but about the transfer of architectural knowledge through 12 Hungarian success stories. The project will address the global phenomenon of architectural career abandonment and in addition to the success stories, will present the results of a wide-ranging student research project in the form of case studies. Nothing to See Here archives the glorious past, critiques current norms and calls new generation of architecture students to action.