Work has begun in earnest on the restoration of the magnificent Neolog synagogue in Szeged, Hungary — the masterpiece of Lipot Baumhorn, pre-WW2 Europe’s most prolific synagogue architect.
As we reported a year ago, the first stage of the government-funded $4 million restoration of the building took place last summer, with urgent conservation carried out to prevent the synagogue from having to close its doors.
The Jewish community in Szeged says that the current work will be concentrated on the exterior of the building, but that visitors will still be able to tour the interior, and concerts and other events are still planned to be held there.
The exterior reconstruction will include work on the dome, the towers, the roof, and the facade, as well as on gutters and drainage. Plans also call for the renovation of the fence and the Biblical garden designed by Rabbi Immanual Löw, who consulted with Baumhorn on many facets of the design and lavish decorative elements, which include precious stained glass windows incorporating rich Jewish symbolism.
The government announced in 2014 that it had allocated some one billion forints (then $4 million) for much-needed repairs on the building, which was inaugurated in 1903. It is hoped that all reconstruction work will be concluded by the synagogue’s 115th anniversary in 2018.
A bas relief carving of the dome of the Szeged synagogue floating in clouds, as befits the architect’s most famous creation, decorates the upper portion of Baumhorn’s gravestone in Budapest’s Kozma utca Jewish cemetery.
Read JHE Coordinator Ruth Ellen Gruber on visiting Baumhorn’s grave