SUMMARY 2009/1

Sándor Bacskai interviewed Tamás Farkas. The press photographer born in 1925 in Marosvásárhely, is known most of all for his theatre photos and actor’s portraits. He had given up his technical college studies for photographing. He studied studio photographing in the classical sense; in 1948 he became member of the Fotó Kisipari Termelőszövetkezet (Photographic Artisans’ Co-operative), and later he joined the Magyar Fotó Állami Vállalat (Hungarian Photographic State Company). In 1956 he took with the press photo collection of the MTI Fotó (Hungarian Press Agency) to Vienna. For a couple years he was living in Canada. Having returned to Hungary he worked for the magazines Tükör, Új Tükör and thereafter for Pesti Műsor. In Those Sundaygirls Gábor Pfisztner reviews Luca Gőbölyös’s photo series – Sundaygirls: “In her works the creator ego’s reflection to situations which the creator got as private person into, has always played an important part. In the process of artistic creation she kept questioning or confirming her position as the party but also as the subject of the works. This duality became increasingly deliberate and powerful in her works in recent years”. In Soft, light and light-soft Virág Böröczfy reports on Éva Szombat’s photos: “Her photos – apart from unveiling the telltale of pictures we are all around surrounded by – harp on about how much their contents can be identified with the real social expectation, where is boundary between the roles promoted by the media and the real social roles…” In Transformation Sándor Radnóti writes about György Tóth: “The subjects of his photos are nudes however far from any idealisation. But they are far from the opposite, as well, the modern examples of which are also well-known: from the provocative frailty, decaying, ugliness of the body. His models are ordinary women not fitted for the role of the playmates in Playboy”. The subject of Zsófia Somogyi’s article – “What do you see brethren? – By means of the mirror ... even for the thousands time.” – is Samuel Havadtői's series – “Homage á André Kertész”. The pictures of men’s bodies are distorted in the same way as the women’s bodies on the photos of Kertész’s series “Distortion” back in 1933. A conference celebrating the 30th anniversary of the European Society for the History of Photoraphy was held in November 2008 in the building of the Austrian Academy of Science in Vienna. Katalin Bognár museologist of the Historical Photo Gallery of the Hungarian National Museum reports on the event. In Your warm lap waiting among stars… Gábor Pfisztner writes about Thomas Ruff German photo artist one representative of the Becher-school: “As if he has realised that by repeating and quoting himself he cannot but going around himself. Therefore, he has broken with the picture format, with its interpretation and critique in order to return to an abstract world which would no longer threaten anyone with its sight, but just secretly, in the depths it would make accessible, cautious and irresolute hints at its origin and essence.” Virág Böröczfy visited Carla van de Puttelaar’s exhibition in Budapest: “Paradoxically, some imperfectness or awkwardness of minor importance on the meticulously composed pictures become visible, the process of photo making becomes important since it may easily happen that something appearing in front of the lens of the camera would suddenly disappear from the model’s body. Carla van de Puttelarr tries to seize in this sense the non-recurring moment in the process of time, the uniqueness in the multitude…” A series of interviews by Klára Szarka – Reflections about photo book publishing over the last two decades – scrutinises changes since the change of the political system. In the previous issues of Fotóművészet the author interviewed among others Mihály Gera, Attila P?cze and Ottó Kaiser, Károly Kincses and Péter Baki. In the third and last part of this series the interviewees are photo artists László Lugo Lugosi and Péter Korniss as well as Ráchel Racsiborszky manager of the bookshop in the Mai Manó Ház. Finally the article reports on the Nemzeti Kulturális Alap Fotóművészeti Szakmai Kollégium (Photo Artists College of the National Cultural Fund). The predecessor of Bank Austria established a photo gallery and set up its own collection in the 1970s, and it has been organizing visual educating programs to it. In 1987 the project was terminated but in 2008 the bank decided to exhibit the Photography Collection in the Vienna Kunstforum – Gábor Ébli reports on the event in From Bank to Museum. The canonization of photo art. In Distance sensation Zsuzsanna Kemenesi reports on the Paris Photo 2008 exhibition: “In 2006 Japan was the honorary guest of Paris Photo. It was for the first time that the biennial event got an insight into the art of the Far-East; the Japanese culture has been presented from the Meji-era to the avant-garde movements in the 1930s, and from the post-WW years to the latest contemporary multimedia works.” Just a few names from the exhibiting artists: Yamaguchi Noriko, Yneda Tomoko, Narahashi Asako, Fukase, Masahisa. According to the title of the article by Ferenc Markovics – An outdated term will be going down the drain: The “successful” photo”. “For long I have been collecting the ‘material’ to this writing, initially I intended to edit it around the turn of the century when – we believed – digital technique would come out on the top followed by a number of changes. Meanwhile it is over, and it was only recently that I arranged the proofs of one of the processes piled up in all hast – as additional material to the end of a photographic era.” Zoltán Fejér writes about a series of slides made by József Németh who passed away in 2006. The slides were made in the House of Parliament, and to date they have been used as reference photos to refurbishing works: “József Németh made the slides in the summer and autumn in the year 1944; several photos show that the colour windows had been removed from the building and put in safe place.” György Szegő’s article - Hôtel du Nord – was written apropos Sándor Trauner (Alexandre Trauner) stage designer’s exhibition in Miskolc: “These pictures are full of emotions… they transmit the visual and creative challenges of filming in controversial duality. They are not man-centred, yet love is hidden behind them. They are genre pictures, even if the street empty.” In the latest, actually the fifth part of Endre Schwanner’s series – Social column – the author talks about the 1970s: “Among the scenes of studio exhibitions the Fészek Művészklub (Fészek Artists Club) and the Ferencvárosi Pincetárlat (Ferencváros Basement Gallery) were the most popular.” Moreover, the article contains photographic documentation of the international product exhibition organised on the 25th anniversary of the foundation of the Ofotért Co., in 1974. In Royal mannequins Emőke Tomsics presents the Pictures of the royal visit in 1866: “The Hungarian clothes and the Buda Royal Palace as background were meant to stress the Royal Family’s commitment to being Hungarian monarchs, they are the proof of the jubilation that accompanied the visit of Emperor Francis Joseph and his family in Buda. The vacant Hungarian Royal Palace was constant symbol of the orphaned Hungarian nation, its great power ambitions doomed to failure, and an explanation for the capital’s inactive social life.” József Rák’s series on photo technology – DigiTREND – has reached its 10th part. Subjects of the article are the “Digital” lenses. Of course, as there exists literally no digital picture, the situation is the same as regards “digital” lens. Actually, the term is aimed to define a new technology. The title of the second part of Attila Montvai’s new series on phototechnology is The relationship between the measurable and visible parameters of photography – Wooden ring from iron, secrets of printing. Main topics of the article are Colour control, the DPI – LPI dilemma; Tone richness – tone unsteadiness – colour banding; Characteristics of systems producing the visible picture. New albums on Péter Tímár’s Bookshelf: Péter Korniss: Devotion (1967–2008); Csilla E. Csorba: Ady – The portrait turned face (all photographs of Endre Ady); Photographs of the ’56 revolution in photo collections; Three books of László2 Hegedűs; Harry Callahan: Eleanor; Nan Goldin: The Beautiful Smile; Michal Celbin: Strangely Familiar (Acrobats, Athletes, and Other Travelling Troups); Jock Sturges: Life-time; Mary Ellen Mark: EXPOSURE.