Art of Survival: A Mother’s Day tribute to a graceful urban visionary.
As Ukraine fights bravely to save its treasured historic monuments from ruin, many are reminded of an earlier crisis in a neighboring country: postwar Hungary, where patriots also rose in protest against Russian domination. Among those speaking out against the Soviet destruction of Budapest’s monuments, including the 1950 takedown of the city’s first Lajos Kossuth memorial—erected in 1927 on Kossuth Square, symbolic center of the Magyar state—were an archaeologist and his artist wife; objectors were sternly warned to “zakroy svoy rot” (shut your mouth). In October 1956, Soviet tanks’ brutal assault on Kossuth Square left hundreds massacred, and toppled still more statues.