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Budapest Statue Park (Szobor Park)

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Budapest Memento Park (Statue Park)
Gigantic Reminders of the Past

Visit the Budapest Memento Park (or Statue Park) and you'll have a fairly good impression what life was like in Hungary during the communist regime.

Standing at prominent places throughout Budapest the purpose of the symbolic statues was to constantly remind people of how great and powerful the Soviet system was.

After the fall of the communist system in 1989 all statues were moved to the outskirts of Budapest to establish a unique museum.

statue _01

The Budapest Memento Park museum will shad some light on what was going on behind the Iron Curtain. Buy a booklet on the spot (costs around 600 HUF/2.4 €) that will tell you the story behind each statue and helps you understand what you'll be seeing.

Address: corner of Balatoni út and Szabadkai utca in XXII. district
Tel: +36 1 425 7500

Opening Hours: every day from 10.00 till sunset

Entrance fee: adults: 1500 HUF, 1000 HUF with Budapest Card. Students: 1000 HUF. TIP: Buy your Budapest card in advance online. The Card entitles you to discount admission to a wide range of Budapest sights and attractions and free travel on the public transport system. The 48-hour card costs 6300 HUF, the 72-hour card is 7500 HUF.

Getting there
History of the Statue Park
Monuments in the Park
Souvenir Shop

Getting to Memento Park - Budapest Statue Park

You have two options to get to the park which is a bit out of the city centre.
If you're a first-time visitor to Budapest your best bet is to take the direct bus service to Memento Park. You can get to the park by public transport, if you're already familiar with travelling in Budapest.
If you aren't, on this page you can learn more about how to travel in Budapest by public transport.

Direct buses depart from Deák tér (where the 3 metro lines intersect) bus terminal in the city centre. Unfortunately the stop is not clearly visible from far, just skim through the schedules on the posts and look for the Statue Park logo and timetable.

Return ticket costs 3950 HUF for adults. For students and for Budapest card holders it's 2450 HUF. Admission to the Statue Park museum is included in the price. You can buy your ticket on the bus.

The whole visit including tarvelling there and back is 2 and half hours. The trip to the park takes about 30 minutes and you'll have 1 hour and 30 minutes to look around in the park before the bus returns back.

Departures of the Direct Buses:

Every day at 11.00, in June-July at 11.00 and at 15.00 daily.

By Public Transport:

By public transport, take bus No.150 from the corner of Fehérvári út and
Bocskai út (Allee Mall) and get off at the Memento Park bus stop. "
- Mon-Fri in every 20 minutes (10, 30, 50),
- Sat-Sun in every 30 minutes (05, 35). The ride to Memento Park is about 30 min. Day passes, BKV-tickets (300 HUF, 320 HUF as of 1st February 2010.) and Budapest Cards are valid.
From Kelenföldi Pályaudvar (Etele tér by Kelenföld Railway Station) Volánbusz Station (behind Metro 4 construction area). Take the bus departing every 15 minutes from gate No. 7-8 to Diósd-Érd. The ride takes 10 minutes. Get off at "Memento Park" stop.

By car: I recommend driving to the Memento Park only for those who know Budapest very well and don't mind traffic jams and roads full with potholes (especially in winter).

The park lies along road No. 7. From the city centre you have to get to Budaörsi road. Coming from the M0 motorway you have to turn off at Diósd onto road No. 7 and drive 5 kms towards Budapest until you get to the Memento Park.
Read about car rental in Budapest.

A bit of Budapest Memento Park History

The future of the statues created in the communist regime caused heated debates after the political changes of 1989/90. Many people reacted with hatred and wanted to destroy the symbols of dictatorship.

Instead of demolishing the stone and bronze reminders of the past 40 years, leaders of the new, democratic political system decided to remove and gather the statues to a place where everybody can view them.

László Szörényi a literary historian mentioned first the idea of Statue Park in an article in 1989. In December 1991 the Assembly of Budapest came to a decision that each districts should choose individually the statues to be removed.

The Cultural Committee of the Assembly invited a tender regarding the placement of statues and the design of the Statue Park. Ákos Eleőd architect's (Architectural Studio Vadász and Partners) tender won.

The XXII. district offered a place on Tétényi plane for establishing the park. Altough the museum has not yet been completed until now it opened in autumn 1993.

A continuous brick wall is needed to create a uniform setting for the statues. Some other establishments to provid for the visitors have not been built either. Despite these deficiencies thousands of foreigners and Hungarians visit the Budapest Statue Park every year.

Monuments in Budapest Statue Park

You can meet some major communist top dogs in this opendair museum like Lenin, Marx and Engels and their Hungarian equivalents. The system rigorously censored everything.

In communism artworks could existed and displayed if they supported the ideology of the regime.

Gigantic statues of hard-working men and women, heroic soldiers stand here abandoned and evoking memories of fake glory.

There were two kinds of people in those grim years: leaders of the system possessing unquestionable authority and the faceless mass of people. (Actually a third type existed too, the resistants who either expressed their antipathy against the dictatorship or just bore in silence.)

That is what these statues represent.

Communist Statues in Budapest Memento Park

The park consists of five semicircles, with six statues standing along each. The semicircles encompass a larger circle. The exhibited items range from giant statues of workers, heroes and party leaders to plaques commemorating certain communist events.

Standing next to these massive monuments one can feel really intimidated. I think that was one of their main purposes towering above everybody at their original places. Now they're only a bunch of mementos of a bleak past.

Top Attractions in the Memento Park

Stalin Grandstand and Statue in Budapest, Hungary

REmoving Stalin's boots in Budapest in 1956

The Stalin Grandstand on Felvonulási tér where the parades took place on Communist holidays.

The removal of the Statue marks the beginning of the 1956 revolution in Budapest.

Today the replica of the monuments stand on the eastern and western side of Tanú tér (Witness Square) in the Memento Park.

Stalin's tribune:

A proportional replica of the original Stalin grandstand and the statue that was pulled down in 1956.

Stalin's boots -once part of the huge bronze Stalin statue that stood on today's 56-osok tere and was removed during the 1956 revolution)

Stalin's Boots and replica of his grandstand in Budapest Statue Park

Stalin's monumental boots- symbol of oppression during the communist regime

Exhibition in the barracks: The myth of people's longing for freedom in 1956, 1989-90.
Theatre in the Barracks: The Life of an Agent (Directed by G?bor Zsigmond Papp) documentary film introduces methods to hide bugs, house-searches, recruitment and networking

Souvenir Shop in Budapest Memento Park

How ironic that capitalism, against what the communists fought so fiercely, is thriving now in the small souvenir shop in front of the eyes of the stony remains of Soviet regime.
In the Red Star shop you can buy all kinds of communist kitsch. For example you can get the last breath of communism in a small can or a candle in the shape of Lenin.

Other gifts you can take home: