János Balázs
"History, the fate of Hungarian and Gypsy people, myths, and his incredible lexical knowledge appear in his poems as a fantastic avalanche-like stream and take shape in his vision-like paintings. He takes interenst in everything. History, the fate of humanity, the gypsy slum, flowers and animals, Hiroshima - visions and reality. As a hermit, János Balázs matures into a Renaissance man. He wants to have a say in everything, he wants to add something to everything. He creates without leaving his usual environment, without electricity, radio, newspaper or TV. His information is mixed with the original ancient thoughts carried in his genes, and perhaps this is the reason for his colorful world. The pictures are "confusing mysteries", as he himself put it, "the existence of the whole world is hidden in them"
The man living in a rural gypsy slum, who completed only two grades of elementary school read everything he could get his hands on, from Homer to the Hungarian classics to Shakespeare, Balzac and Nietzsche. His paintings and poems were nourished by his reading experiences and the world colored by his imagination; he also wrote a diary, and the "hermit of Pécskődomb" played instruments he made himself. He started painting at the age of 63, and created his life's work in just 8 years. He was quickly discovered in his narrower homeland, Salgótarján, where his first exhibition was organized at the end of the sixties, and since then his memory has been conscientiously cherished. His national fame was followed by a series of foreign exhibitions following the resurgence of interest in naive art in the early 1970s.
Tamás Péli
He graduated from the Vocational High School of Fine and Applied Arts in 1967. From 1968 to 1973, he was a student of the State Academy of Fine Arts in Amsterdam. He was a member of parliament from 1992 to 1994. In his paintings he tried to capture the fate of the Gypsies. He exhibited as an artist since 1970. He presented himself at a solo exhibition in the Netherlands in 1990, in Amsterdam in 1972 and 1976 at the Rátkai Klub in 1986, in Berlin in 1994. He participated in collective exhibitions in Cologne in 1972, in France (Vance) in 1980, in Paris in 1985, in the Rátkai Klub in 1991, 1994.
He is the first professional artist of Roma origin to win the Kossuth Prize. He was the Master of painter István Szentandrássy. The work of both of them is considered by the Hungarian profession to be part of the universal visual artist canon, their school-creating art spanning several generations. Not only in their art, but also with their individuality, they were decisive figures in Roma public life and among Roma intellectuals.
The Wizard's Tale refers to the presence of the mythical thinking of mankind. It was created in order to strengthen the Roma identity, inspired by the origin stories passed down from word of mouth, from generation to generation in the Romani culture.
Balogh Balázs András
His parents became victims of the Holocaust, Balázs András Balogh was raised by his grandmother until five years old, after which he was placed in a foster home. He was given to foster parents, but they did not send him to school, instead sent him to beg. In his adult years, he earned his living by hard manual labor, worked as a mason in the construction industry, worked in steel factories and mines. On his second marriage, he settled in Salgótarján and he became unemployed in 1992.
He was always very interested in drawing and painting, he copied a lot, especially the paintings of János Balázs, unfortunately he destroyed all the copies, and only from 1975 did he appear with his unique independent works. From then on, he soon became a regular exhibiting artist. "His art is very unusual, he mainly paints the night, and he assembles monumental, symbolic compositions from small dots of paint. His paintings were inspired by bitter childhood memories, and on his canvases he emphasizes poverty and exclusion with the monotonous repetition of stylistic elements and figures." His great strength is the figurative representation of groups, the insight into the entire lifestyle of the gypsy population, his art is characterized by its integrity.
Events:
11. 11. 2023. Finissage - The Wizard's Tale - Selected works from the Horn-Collection
