Born a 100 years ago: Jenő Medveczky

Jenő Med­vecz­ky was one of the most out­stand­ing ma­s­ters of 20th cent­ury Hun­ga­ri­an paint­ing and print-mak­ing. Tra­ined in Bu­da­pest, Rome and Paris, he sha­ped the clas­sic tra­di­tions to his sin­gu­lar pro­fi­le. He was att­rac­ted to the Greco-Latin her­i­tage just as much as to 20th cent­ury French paint­ing. He did not hide his af­fi­ni­ti­es with the his great an­ces­tors in Hun­ga­ri­an paint­ing, and en­joyed the fri­ends­hip of some elder ma­s­ters. He was a pain­ter of mo­nu­men­tal works, as his sur­vi­ving fre­scos and murals re­ve­al. His strictly con­struc­ted paint­ings of pure co­lo­urs and gra­phic works of firm li­near qu­a­lity were pre­sen­ted to the spec­ta­tor as pas­si­on­ate con­fes­sions. His art is cha­rac­te­ri­zed by ele­gance, subt­le in­tel­lec­tu­al pro­fun­dity, ly­ri­cal play­ful­ness, mo­ti­on, mu­si­ca­lity - whet­her the theme is a tra­gic fate or the tri­fles of every­day life. His ex­cel­lent port­ra­its ra­dia­te ide­als.
The work of Jenő Med­vecz­ky, a mem­ber of the Scho­ol of Rome, is still being analy­zed. His coll­ec­ted paint­ings have never been shown in Bu­da­pest. The ret­ros­pec­tive sho­wing on the 100th an­ni­ver­sary of the pain­ter's birth pre­sents works also from fo­rei­gn and Hun­ga­ri­an pri­vate coll­ec­tions.
As a rep­re­s­en­ta­tive of 20th cent­ury Hun­ga­ri­an art, he lived to­get­her with the leg­acy be­qu­eat­hed by Me­di­ter­ra­ni­an cul­tu­re to Hun­ga­ri­an art. He proc­la­i­med his great pre­de­ces­sors as his ma­s­ters, since he was aware that his ge­ni­us and ta­lent was not de­pen­dent on them so much as to im­pair his au­to­nomy and aut­hen­ti­ci­ty. He had respect for his con­tem­por­ari­es and the great minds of his age, who en­nob­led his art. He be­came their equal on ac­count of his in­tel­lec­tu­al stance and ar­tis­tic ma­s­tery.
He would be a 100 years old this year.
On this oc­cas­ion, his works ra­rely or never shown to the pub­lic, being in pri­vate coll­ec­tions at home or ab­road, are put on disp­lay.
The ca­ta­lo­gue is writ­ten by Zsu­zsa Job­bágy from the angle of an art his­to­ri­an today.
2002. June 12. - July 3.

Ernst Museum

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2002. May 28. - August 20.
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2002. July 10. - August 20.
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