Life-carpet | Exhibition of Péter Ujházi

In 1966 Péter Uj­há­zi, a stu­dent of Aurél Ber­náth, re­turns home to his na­tive town, Szé­kes­fe­hér­vár, where he still lives, as a gra­du­a­te of paint­ing. The ex­hi­bit­ion tit­led Life-car­pet pre­sents a se­lec­ti­on of five de­ca­des of ar­tis­tic out­put, comp­ri­sing more than two thou­sand paint­ings, gra­phic works, col­la­ges, box as­semb­la­ges and ce­ra­mic sculp­tu­res. The first room is de­vo­ted to the ar­tist’s early, re­a­lis­tic self­port­ra­its, his self-de­pic­tions and me­tap­ho­ri­cal self-ima­ges that be­came inc­re­a­singly iro­nic and im­bu­ed with hu­mo­ur over the years. Uj­vá­ri often de­picts himself in va­ri­o­us life si­tu­a­tions, as an al­che­mist pain­ter, a lands­cape pain­ter lo­o­king for mo­tifs on the se­a­s­i­de or even a globe­trot­ting iti­ner­ant pain­ter. In some of the pic­tu­res he shows himself as a per­for­mer car­rying the te­at­rum mundi on his back, tra­vers­ing end­less roads with the Great The­at­re of the World enc­los­ed in boxes. The clown – the key fi­gu­re of the cir­cus and a tra­di­ti­o­nal sym­bol of the ar­tist – also emer­ges among his me­tap­ho­ri­cal self-ima­ges. One of the sce­nes re­lat­ing every­day si­tu­a­tions is Mee­ting, which is a ref­lec­ti­on upon two fa­mous mee­tings in art his­to­ry, na­mely upon the pic­tu­re tit­led Bon­jour Mon­sieur Co­ur­bet and its pa­raph­ra­se, Bon­jour Mon­sieur Gau­guin. Uj­há­zi meets a drink­ing buddy and they have a drink to ce­le­b­ra­te. The self-ref­lec­ting works call the exis­ten­ce of ob­jec­tive re­a­lity into quest­ion, the sub­ject of these de­pic­tions is the ar­tist himself and the si­tu­a­tions he per­so­nally ex­pe­ri­en­ced. We can see Uj­há­zi from the ins­ide and the out­si­de: the ar­tist is able to se­pa­ra­te himself from himself. It is a mode of self-inspec­ti­on, where pon­der­ing his own self is a means of self-exp­lo­ra­ti­on. Once asked about why he ap­pe­ars in his pic­tu­res so often, he said, “Be­ca­u­se I’m close to myself, be­ca­u­se I’m also there in the story, in the batt­le, the pub, the open air, the ra­il­way. The pain­ter must be everyw­he­re, if I love paint­ing ra­il­way sta­tions or rails, why couldn’t I be stand­ing there? In any case, no mat­ter how pro­fes­si­o­nally a pic­tu­re is pro­du­ced, I must be seen, the pic­tu­re can­not con­ce­al me.”

From the 1970s Nadap be­came one of the main ve­nues for Uj­há­zi’s cre­a­tive work. The vil­lage lying along the road cros­sing th­ro­ugh the Ve­len­ce Moun­tains is fa­mous for its le­vel­l­ing stone, the to­po­gra­phi­cal ba­se­point of Hun­gary. The ar­tist often co­ve­red the twenty-ki­lo­met­re dis­tance bet­ween Szé­kes­fe­hér­vár and Nadap by bike. “I think I ne­e­ded a bicyc­le for my ove­rall ope­ra­ti­on. It meant speed and the op­por­tunity to get to pla­ces for examp­le where I wo­uldn’t have gone on foot. This pro­vin­ci­al bi­king speed has som­eth­ing to do with my way of se­e­ing things, my moving pic­tu­res.” Some of the paint­ings in this hall allow us to exa­mi­ne this pe­cu­li­ar way of spa­ti­al vi­si­on. The ar­tist si­mul­ta­ne­o­usly uses de­pic­tions from va­ri­o­us pers­pec­ti­ves, ar­rang­ing them to crea­te the il­lu­si­on of mo­ti­on in the ob­ser­ver. Anot­her group of works is made up of his lands­ca­pes and fo­liage pic­tu­res. With his na­tu­ral de­pic­tions rend­ered with imp­r­es­si­o­nis­tic ges­tu­res Uj­há­zi so­ught to in­no­va­te lands­cape paint­ing. Paint­ings with a squ­a­re for­mat ty­pi­cally pro­vi­de the op­por­tunity for an open com­po­sit­i­o­nal con­struc­ti­on, for the cre­a­ti­on of end­lessly con­ti­nu­ing lands­cape cyc­les. Bes­ides cap­tu­ring the ex­pe­ri­en­ce of lands­ca­pes, Nadap was a sour­ce of ins­p­ira­ti­on for the ar­tist’s nar­ra­tive pic­tu­res. The pub paint­ings he made in Nadap and the de­pic­tions of the world of people show one of the main di­rec­tions in Uj­há­zi’s in­te­rest: he jo­ined ranks with the ch­ro­nic­les of every­day stori­es and games of fate.

The third room int­ro­du­ces us to human pro­fu­si­on – the Great The­at­re of the World, at times a ver­i­tab­le petri dish of Hell – th­ro­ugh works from Uj­há­zi’s early de­pic­tions to his pyra­mid pic­tu­res of the 1980s and the mass sce­nes at traf­fic junc­tions he pain­ted in Bu­da­pest in the early part of the 21st cent­ury. Uj­há­zi spoke about his ex­pe­ri­en­ces of the en­vi­rons of Örs vezér Squ­a­re and Kő­bá­nya-Kis­pest metro sta­ti­on, which he exp­res­sed in some pic­tu­res, thus: “The world is ugly, there are exp­lo­sions nearby, you hear all the night­ma­re news in the world fa­ster, di­sas­ters of all kinds can be heard and seen al­most ins­tantly. People have to live with all this, and add to this their own spec­ta­c­les. Des­pi­te this, I don’t think ours is an ext­ra­or­di­nary age.” The clo­sing pic­tu­re of the ex­hi­bit­ion, Bog­ey­man in the City Cent­re, con­cep­tu­ally con­ti­nues the vi­si­on­ary sce­nes re­cor­ded in the ca­p­ital, but its venue is the ar­tist’s na­tive town of Szé­kes­fe­hér­vár. Uj­há­zi does not pass jud­ge­ment but simply shows the ab­sur­di­ti­es of life and human fa­i­lings. Alt­ho­ugh we might be em­bit­te­red at times by what we see, Uj­há­zi’s hu­mo­ur and irony dull the pain, while his bril­li­ant paint­ings and sculp­tu­res rich in ma­te­ri­als even lift our spi­rits. They bring to mind a fa­mous say­ing by the 18th-cent­ury thin­ker, Ho­race Wal­po­le, which he made about his own age but which espe­ci­ally chi­mes with Péter Uj­há­zi’s world­view and ar­tis­tic app­ro­ach: “The world is a trag­edy to those who feel, but a co­medy to those who think.”


Cura­tor: Ka­ta­lin T. Nagy 

 

Vir­tu­al tour

Life-car­pet | Ex­hi­bit­ion of Péter Uj­há­zi

Élet­sző­nyeg | Uj­há­zi Péter ki­ál­lí­tá­sa

Spon­sors

2021. October 16. - December 5.
Tickets
2021. October 13. - November 28.
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Layers of Contingency | The Photographs of János Pilinszky

2021. October 22. - November 28.
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Ákos Matzon: Space seeker