SUMMARY 2006/1-2

The first article in this issue of Fotóművészet is Sándor Bacskai’s interview with Zoltán Hajtmanszki. ‘‘It gives me a good feeling when in the morning I set out for photographing… An explorer’s curiosity sets me off for work. I explore human viewpoints, and I try to collect visual material of them. I make photos be­cause I am a man with visual thinking, and this is the way I can express my thoughts’’ – says the young photographer.

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Gábor Pfisztner talked to László Beke at the Hungary today photo exhibition. The main point of the series of exhibitions organized by the European Central Bank is that every year young photo-graphers from another country – in particular from the new EU member-countries – are given an opportunity to express what they think of their country. The title Hungarian genre pictures today was meant to motivate the contestants to let their country appear through their lens.

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In ‘‘Divatvalóság’’ (Fashion reality) Klára Szarka discusses Hungarian fashion photography today. The way she portrays the state of fashion, show business and visualization is well-expressed by two section titles ‘‘American trend-maker and European apo-caliptics’’ and ‘‘Is everything still just mainstream with us?’’ The author’s statements are confirmed by her discussions with András Hajdú and István Lábady.

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The subject of the above article is completed with an interview ‘‘It wasn’t heroic but just primitive age’’ by Klára Szarka with fashion photographer Miklós Lengyel picture editor of the one-time fashion magazine Ez a Divat.

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In ‘‘Cserebere’’(‘‘swapping’’) Károly Kincses presents Judit Kurtág: ‘‘I have seen very few people, very few artists identifying themselves with their works as much as she does. The work in very rare and exceptional moments is identical with its creator. Maybe because of her genes or her bringing up is the reason that it is working this way almost automatically and infallible.’’

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In ‘‘Tins, junks and lyubityels’’ Zsuzsanna Kemenesi praises Lajos Major: ‘‘Resisting the temptation of high-tech he has remained true to the ancient magic of photography. He accepts eventualities, he moves together with the world… I must admit, I have always been fascinated by Lajos Major’s photographing without looking into the viewfinder. One could say, it’s like sitting on a horse blindfolded and shooting an arrow backward with left hand.’’

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Balázs Turay photo artist writes a commentary to the pictures of his exhibition Chinese Feast: ‘‘It was right supper time… As the orders reached the kitchen, spots and silhouettes began to swarm, high caps, bowing figures, huge colanders packed with steaming noodle took form on the window-pane’’ – you can read in ‘‘Shadows on a window in Beijing’’.

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In ‘‘From new (visual) angles’’ Zsófia Somogyi reviews Szabolcs Barakonyi young photographer’s pictures apropos his latest work ‘‘It’s London’’. In her opinion, for Barakonyi the subject is the person and his surroundings (even if the person is not pre-sent) with his inherent absurdities, strange sights which are made the pictures of a certain place by the photographer’s sensitivity, way of seeing things and technique. His series are the revival of subjective documentarism.

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Photographers have been invited for the forth time to participate in the Panasonic Lumix photo competition, and about ten thousand digital photos have been sent in for the competition. The spread of digital technique has suddenly opened up wide perspectives for the masses, it offers chances; but digging deeper into the problems of the phenomenon, it brings with completely new types of the problems of photographing, as side effect. Dóra Szeg? writes about it in ‘‘Individualized and in-numerable’’.

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Gábor Pfisztner reports on two exhibitions: First, apropos Diane Arbus’ retrospective exhibition in the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, he scrutinizes the still reputed photographer: ‘‘What has made Arbus’s pictures different (of others)? In what do they differ from those of his predecessors? Can we talk about (different) way of thinking, interpretation, approach, or is it just instinctive reaction or rather one resulting from own experience but certainly not deliberate, to stimuli from the outside world, it is their extradition, fixation, material expression for the presentation of which the camera seems to be particularly suitable means?’’

In the second report, ‘‘Depressing present between past and future’’, the author deals with the contemporary Chinese photo exhibition also in the Victoria & Albert Museum: ‘‘Changes in the last fifteen years have marked out the thematic framework of a new art, the form of which has been dominated by the photo (and video)… It is not the photo itself that is important but what is made visible by it; the concept for the presentation of which it is suitable, the story it carries on its surface, all this done simply, directly, naturally and informally.’’

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In ‘‘Town/Landscape/Intervention’’ Zsófia Somogyi reports on a photo exhibition with the same title. Works of the following photo artists are put on show at the exhibition reflecting the different problems of the urban landscape: Lukas Schaller, Eva Würdinger, Veronika Hofinger, Laura Samaraweerová, Endre Koronczi and Zsolt Fekete.

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Ferenc Markovics tracks down some members of the Association of Hungarian Photo Artists who had played an active part in founding it, but have meanwhile been forgotten. With the title ‘‘New discoveries’’ he presents the carreer of Éva Szádvári settled down in Brasil (1920), and of Dr Gyula Gróth living in Switzerland.

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Péter Tímár wrote an obituary of István Katona chairman of the Association of Hungarian Photo Artists passed away this year, as well as of Vince Lussa photo artist known most of all for his nudes.

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György Sümegi talked again to people who immortalized episodes of the revolution in 1956. In an interview ‘‘We’ll rectify history’’ the Reader is made acquainted with László Almásy photo artist. At that time Almásy had had a photographic studio in Budapest, later he used to live in the US, and not long ago he came home to Hungary. Then in another interview ‘‘Own and collected photographs’’ Zsolt Pap relates his personal experience in October 1956.

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In ‘‘Felhőfejes’’ (sky-high headed goal) Zoltán Fejér commemorates István Szendrő who led a successful life both as technician and inventor, and as press photographer.

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In ‘‘Tracing Hungarian pictures in Vienna’’ Etelka Baji reports on György Klösz’s and János Indrikó’s pictures in the collection of the Technical Museum in Vienna; Károly Zelesny’s album in the Austrian National Archive; Hungarian related photographs in Albertina; a portrait of Ferenc Liszt and a series of photos of Sándor Rózsa in the Austrian National Library.

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The photo-technology block starts with the latest part of Endre Schwanner’s ‘‘Leica’’ series. The 4th part of this series that reviews the history of camera and lens manufacturing is dedicated to the automation of photometry and the development of flashlight.

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In the latest part of his series ‘‘digi-Trend’’, József Rák tries to answer questions about ‘‘amphibian cameras’’ i.e. about digital cameras suitable for making motion pictures. Two sections in the article deal with picture format and resolution.

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Sándor Tátrai’s series Colour Management continues. This time the author gives advices on monitor calibration and profile making.

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New albums on Péter Tímár’s ‘‘Bookshelf’’: Endre Friedmann: I live of the moment. Photos from his oeuvre, 1954-1979; History in pictures. Selection from the archive of Pesti Napló; László Gál: Only the pleasant (genre pictures in Budapest from the fifties and sixties); Jean-Paul Goude and Patrick Maurics: So Far so Goude; Arbus, Model, Strömholm; Modernist Photography; Selection from the Daniel Cowin Collection; Tina Barney: The Europeans; Edward Burtynsky: China; Philip Trager: Faces; Jim Dine: Drive; Mark Steenerson: The Cement War; Sally Mann: Deep South; Richard Avedon: Woman in the Mirror.