August 29 2009

The Robert Capa exhibit at the Ludwin Museum was awesome. What a guy. Must have been very charismatic, judging by this photo by Ruth Orkin. They have big posters of it all around the city.

It's amazing how many famous photos he took. They had many large prints of his shots and information both in Hungarian and English. Also, if you are under 26 you get half off admission; so it was just 950 forints to see the Capa exhibit and the permanent collection, which was also very nice. The Capa exhibit is only there until October, however.

They had a print of his last photo (frame number 11) including the sprocket holes and the start of the empty frame 12, which had a powerful effect on me.

If you do get to Budapest, make sure to check out Statue park/Memento' Park/Szobor Park (link). It is where they collected all the old communist statues. (Hungarians are still somewhat miffed with the Russians, understandably). It is a bit of a hassle to get to (For me, for instance, I took a bus to the metro to a tram, bought a ticket to a privately owned bus to the park), and is relatively pricey (1.500 forints) but the statues are fantastic. I shot more than 2 rolls there - I probably would have shot more but it was all I had with me.

If you are ever shooting in Budapest, there are plenty of small camera shops around. If you need a good selection of film though, I suggest Fotolux on Karoly krt. between the Astoria and Deak Ter stops on the red metro line. They had a great selection of film, including black and white and medium format. They might have had sheet film as well. Prices were comparable to most brick and mortar photo shops (about $7.50 for a 36 exposure roll of TMax 100).

I can't wait to see my photos...