Gyula Rudnay Exhibition

The Ernst Mus­e­um is or­ga­ni­zing an ex­hi­bit­ion of Gyula Rud­nay's work in ho­no­ur of the 125th an­ni­ver­sary of his birth this year. With this ex­hi­bit­ion we will recall a by now al­most for­got­ten oeuvre, all the more per­ti­nent since the ar­tist int­ro­du­ced himself and his work in this buil­ding in 1918. The last ex­hi­bit­ion of Rud­nay's work was at the Hun­ga­ri­an Na­ti­o­nal Gal­lery in 1969.

The strength of Rud­nay's pic­tu­res lie in co­lo­ur; he com­pos­es with co­lo­ur: flame red and lu­mi­no­us white, tra­gic black and warm brown pat­ches form danc­ing pe­as­ants, re­vel­l­ing gy­p­si­es, the des­pa­iring crowd fle­e­ing the war. Pre­sum­ably Mun­ká­csy was the great pre­de­ces­sor and role model, but the dy­na­mic mo­ve­ment, the mo­men­tum, the rhythm are the ar­tist's own as he finds his in­de­pen­dent voice, as are the port­ra­its and port­ra­it-like fi­gu­ra­tive works, which are in re­a­lity "de­pic­tions" of emo­ti­on.

The can­vas­ses con­tain­ing nu­me­rous fi­gu­res refer back to Hun­ga­ri­an "an­te­ce­dents". They are fil­led with Bie­der­mei­er la­di­es and high­way­men on hor­se­back, gro­ups at table fea­sting and chat­ting from the pre 1848 world of the County Court judge. Mem­ori­es of child­ho­od and youth come to life; the fre­qu­ent guests and way­far­ers at the fa­mily house live on th­ro­ugh the ar­tist's ima­gi­na­ti­on. A kind of slightly his­to­ri­ci­zing view, going beyond re­al­ism or ri­sing above it, recalls Hun­ga­ri­an Bie­der­mei­er or rat­her, the re­form era.

Most of Rud­nay's lands­ca­pes are cha­rac­te­ri­zed not by the pre­ci­se rep­re­s­en­ta­ti­on of re­a­lity, but by the Arcadi­an pu­rity, which grows more re­fi­ned in its tim­eless­ness.

The works in the ex­hi­bit­ion were se­lec­ted pri­ma­rily from mus­e­um coll­ec­tions, but a few dist­in­gu­is­hed works in pri­vate ow­ner­s­hip will also be on show. Some li­vely, eff­ort­less, de­li­ca­te wa­ter­colo­urs and fa­mily and other pho­to­gra­phs comp­le­te the ma­te­ri­al to be vie­wed, to­get­her with a few of the nu­me­rous de­co­ra­tions and me­dals awar­ded in re­cog­ni­ti­on of the ar­tist's rich oeuvre.