SUMMARY 2002/1-2

Klára Szarka interviewed two prominent personalities of Hungarian photography about their latest works. By accident or not, recently several exhibitions have been opened and books published about the human relations and attitudes of photographers. E.g. Tamás Féner has exhibited portraits of his friends, relatives and business partners, in the Fotográfusok Háza (Photographers' House). "Not many people are able to accept that their personality can be interpreted in more than one way, he says. I am not a bit servile, I could say, when I am working, it doesn't interest me, how the person looks like. What interests me is, how I see him. I am interested in those whom I can take with somewhere; I do not photograph the others."

József Tóth has published his portraits of his colleagues in the album Portrait Gallery of Hungarian Photographers. "Those eighty people in my book, are representatives of the classics of Hungarian photo-graphy. The are people immortalised in classic style. I have assumed it deliberately, as one way of portray making."

Eszter Götz comments on Zoltán Gaál's documentary portraits of his fellow-men: "It's a representative sample, sociologists would say. A whole of pictures aimed at completeness, we could say; a thrilling terrain digging up new things layer by layer. It is a kind of revealing the invisible face of a society."

An other essay of Péter Baki presents Balázs Telek, winner of the Pécsi József scholarship for third term. His name is cited mostly with the camera obscura but, as it emerges from the interview, he is a much more colourful character: he paints and plays music besides photographing. Of course, he himself makes his camera obscuras. He wants to make his knowledge and experience accessible in a book.

70th anniversary of the birth of Robert Horling and the 10th anniversaries of his death is being commemorated. He was a highly qualified, and versatile photographer, art historian Ibolya Ury who organised Horling's exhibitions, had earlier commented on him. On his pictures you can discover lyric poetry and clever ideas at the same time, the abstract and the true to facts presentation, all this on artistic level.

I, Serrano - Gábor Pfisztner says, and commenting on the photo artist's exhibition he adds: the heroism of provocation. Andres Serrano is one of the most controversial figures of American contemporary arts, usually, his works provoke intense reactions. "Certainly, his achievement is highly respectable - Pfisztner admits - since he has "created" himself. But all this does not increase his works' significance for themselves, their messages won't be relevant. Beyond creating scandal, the only genuine message is: Here I am, Serrano.

"Pierre & Gilles (active since 1976): Arrache mon coeur" - György Szegő has already seen this exhibition in the Vienna Kunsthaus. Gilles and Pierre two photographers had met first in the post-1968 Paris. Almost immediately they became world-famous ; they have photographed Andy Warhol, Salvador Dalí, Mick Jagger, Yves Saint-Laurent; Jean Marais, Juliette Greco, Claudia Schiffer have been their models, and among others Madonna, Catherine Deneuve, Sylvie Vartan have been their admirers. They have become increasingly successful. The have been living happly....

Károly Kaszás appraises the oeuvre of Finish photo artist and architect Jussi Tiainen - through the eyes of an architect. "Anything - a blade of grass, or a rag of cloud - is enough to a photo artist to express his feelings and thoughts. Jussi Tiainen is apparently fully aware of it and still he relentlessly controls himself in order not to distort the individual personal message of the work of art" Kaszás says.

Fotóművészet presents the Photo Archives of the Hungarian National Museum. In the previous issue Readers could find interviews with Ilona Stemler Balog and Katalin Jalsolvszky. In this issue you will find interviews with Etelka L Baji curator of the annals of Hungarian history from 1919 to 1945, and with Em?ke Tomsics curator of the collection of portraits, cityscape and annals of Hungarian history before 1919.

Katalin Jalsovszky: Four elections in Hungary. In the time of the first two of the four parliamentary elections (in 1945, 1947, 1949 and 1953) in the title of the article, parliamentary democracy provided opportunity for the political parties to fight a genuine fierce political struggle, while the elections in 1949 and 1953 were mere demonstration of power of the one-party dictatorship. Knowing this, Katalin Jalsovszky's selection of press photos is more than mere illustration.

Before Kertész and Brassai. The Antecedents of Modernism in Hungarian Photography is the title of a comprehensive exhibition presenting Hungarian artistic photography in the first quarter of the 20th century, organised in the framework of MAGYart in Paris. Magdolna Kolta curator of the Museum of Hungarian Photography reports on the exhibition in Minor wonders around Hungarian photography.

An exhibition of the photographs of Hungarian-born photographer Robert Capa was opened in Budapest. "He had long been dead when stepping on a landmine in 1954 in Indo-China, he died on the spot. This is the reason why he could not find his place somewhere else in the world. Day by day he had to meet with the end, with death and devastation, because this kept him alive. In this way he was able to fight for life" Valéria Vanília Majoros says in her article "Meeting the death, or the illusion of success and the success: Robert Capa".

György Szegő went to Kreims to visit Karl Blossfeldt's exhibition. Originally a pattern-maker, Blossfeldt had begun his career as successful sculptor, then started photographing plants to bronze patterns. He had published his album "The primitive forms of art" in 1928, then his oeuvre sank into oblivion. And then again, as usual, he has been rediscovered.

Miklós Molnár: Károly Bolyó and his invention - called the trick aperture. There are Hungarian and German documents about Bolyó's invention of double exposure, patented in 1938. The biography of the inventor mysteriously disappeared in 1951, is dim, and the circumstances of his disappearance and of his death are a puzzle. The author undertakes not less than to draw public attention to some "curious" circumstances.

This part of Zoltán Fejér series "Chapters from the history of Hungarian photography" is a thoroughly researched biography of Jenő Dulovits who died thirty years ago. It deals not with the photographer or the highly talented creator of the Duflex camera, but with the cameraman Dulovits. Film director István Sz?ts invited Dulovits in 1943 to shoot the Ballad of Kádár Kata, also he directed the feature film "A fire burning on the mountain" in 1945.