Art works

Art Works
GÁBOR ATTALAI
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– Gábor Attalai: TÁJ–TÁJ, [landscape, landscape] 1970, silver gelatin photography, 30 x 24 cm, reproduced in: László Beke: ’Fotó-látás az új magyar művészetben,’ [Photo-vision in new Hungarian art] Fotóművészet 3 (1972), 18–24.
Photograph of the Tabán church tower taken from the artist’s window, reversed through the use of a concave lens. In the title the second ‘TÁJ’ points downwards.

MIKLÓS ERDÉLY

Erdély Miklós: Fényképezni tilos! [Photography forbidden!], 1974 (photograph: Miklós Erdély and Gizella Rákóczy), photo on Dokubrom paper, 29 x 20.5 cm.

Self-conscious semiotic/pragmatic lawbreaking with an image. The photo work was shown in 1974 at the semiotic congress in Tihany, as well as at the Képregény [ Comics] exhibition at the Young Artists Club, Budapest in 1974.

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– Miklós Erdély : Libazsíros vatta [Cotton wool with goose fat], 1971, cotton wool soaked in goose fat, fastened onto A4 paper, on which is typed: ‘Ne különíts el! Ne izolálj!’ [Don’t segregate! Don’t isolate!’], in a nylon bag.
Made in response to László Beke’s call for art works Elképzelés [idea/imagination/concept], with the instruction that it should be placed together with the other paper works. László Beke, disregarding these instructions, placed the sheet of paper with the cotton wool into a plastic bag. At the time the artist was dealing a lot with goose drippings and the Jewish connotations of other materials.
See, Elképzelés. A magyar konceptművészet kezdetei, Beke László gyűjteménye, 1971, ed. László Beke (Budapest: Nyílt Struktúrák Művészeti Egyesület OSAS and tranzit.hu, 2008), 40.

Works by Miklós Erdély are reproduced with permission of the heirs of the artist.

ÁGNES HÁY

– Ágnes Háy: Sex, beginning of the 1970s, samizdat, 6 A4 pages, 30 x 21 cm, stencil.
Ágnes Háy was a pioneer of Hungarian underground / avant-garde literature and animated film. In her practice she created visual rows of events from ‘everything’, in this case the symbols of both sexes.

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– Ágnes Háy: Jónás, az amittai fia, képregény, [Jónás, the Amish boy, story] beginning of the 1970s, samizdat, 4 A4 pages, 30 x 21 cm, stencil.Reproduced with permission of the artist.

The black and white shadow figures are closely connected with her best known work, Különc úrfi naplója [The diary of Mr. Eccentric]

JÁNOS MAJOR

At the time the artist conceived the basing problem as how to compare the date of a Hungarian artist with the symbolic gestures of the classical avant-garde (here Marcel Duchamp).

János Major: Exercises by János Major, Lesson One, end of the 1960s, beginning of 1970s. Photo on Dokubrom paper, 14.8 x 20.7 cm.

János Major: Kubista Lajos síremléke,[the gravestone of Lajos Kubist / Lajos the Cubist], 1971 (23.3 x 16 cm photo reproduction: György Makky)

The cycle dealing with gravestones is one of Major’s key photographic works. A typed text belongs to it, which from the homonym ‘kubista’, using pseudo-logic and irony, explores the contradictory relations with the founder of various artistic trends in Hungary. (See: Elképzelés. A magyar konceptművészet kezdetei, Beke László gyűjteménye, 1971, ed. László Beke (Budapest: Nyílt Struktúrák Művészeti Egyesület OSAS and tranzit.hu, 2008), 130-1.

Major János: Önarckép [self-portrait], 1969, drawing, reproduction, János Major
Works by János Major are reproduced with permission of the heirs of the artist.

In connection with Major’s pseudo-narcissistic research, (hyper) realist drawing is combined with a photograph and a mirror. (See, László Beke, ’Fotó-látás az új magyar művészetben,’ [Photo-vision in new Hungarian art] Fotóművészet 3 (1972): 18-24.

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GYULA PAUER

Gyula Pauer: Pszeudo, 1970, ‘pseudo’-technique, paper, card, printer’s ink, 42 x 50.6 x 2.3 cm (18 x 24 cm, photo reproduction, György Makky)

Gyula Pauer: Pszeudo, 1970, ‘pseudo’-technique, paper, card, printer’s ink, 42 x 50.6 x 2.3 cm (18 x 24 cm, photo reproduction, György Makky)

The key work from the period, in which the pseudo principle, that is the trompe-l’oeil crease, is represented with photographic faithfulness. Reproduced amongst other publications, on the cover of: László Beke, Eszter Gábor Eszter, Endre Prakfalvi et al., Magyar művészet 1800-től napjainkig (Budapest: Corvina, 2002).

Works by Gyula Pauer are reproduced with permission of the heirs of the artist.

GÉZA PERNECZKY

Géza Perneczky: 4 Önéletrajz Auto–Biography No.4. [Self-portrait auto-biography], 18 August 1970, No. 4 from the Series of 5 concept art exercise books, with numbered (29/50) slips of green-white paper used on the edges of shelves, with a vignette stuck on the cover sheet, stamped with the title.
The early work of the art historian and art critic began with conceptual works: his collage-montage works from ready-made papers were exhibited as early as the end of the 1960s.

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Reproduced with permission of the Géza Perneczky.

ENDRE TÓT
– letter from Endre Tót Endre, with the letter head County Borough of Blackburn Recreation Committee Museums and Art Galleries, 11 July 1975, written in indigo, with one of the O’s between the O’s: ‘I am glad if I can type zero,’, stamped on the back: ‘EVERGREEN IDEA BY ENDRE TÓT’, 1970.
Endre Tót in 1970/1 from one day to the next gave up painting for conceptual art. His basic idea (his ‘concept’) at the time was the null, the nothing, the ‘Evergreen idea’, and the ‘I’d be pleased that…’, or ‘I’m pleased if…’). From the end of the 1970s he increasingly transferred his place of work to Germany; he currently lives and works in Cologn

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– Endre Tót : ‘IF YOU FEEL BORED GO TO THE MOVIE. CLOSE YOUR EYES AND YOU WILL SEE MY FILM. ENDRE TÓT’; ‘nothing ain’t nothing‘ (stamped on the back with ‘Evergreen idea by Endre Tót’); ‘I was glad to print this sentence. Endre Tót’ (on the back a postcard, addressed to László Beke, with a handwritten message: with a red rubber stamp: ‘ÜZENET (MESSAGE); 1971 NOV 19”; ‘Szia Bandi’) 3
Printed cards, in the size of a postcard.

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– Endre Tót: Prelude of mail art, 1961/1971, 7 postcards.

(The backs of 6 illustrated postcards with stamps from 1961, A3 photocopy). From the explanatory text we discover that the artist asked his girlfriend, who was holidaying at the Balaton, to send him a postcard every day. The example of mail art avant la letter.

Works by Endre Tót are reproduced with permission from the artist.