“My father worked at a mirror factory. I was seventh-grade, when he brought me to the plant. I cut and polished glass there first. Even my classmates did not believe that I cut facets on tumblers. Since then, my life is for glass. “We lived in a Budapest apartment house. When I was in the College, I made a small furnace on the fifth-floor laundry room for myself, and for years I secretly blew glass, mainly blue-colored. Sold in boutiques like hot cakes. Then one day I stopped the glass blowing.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   .

I have discovered more opportunities in the mirrors and in flat glass “

The light streams through the skylight of the studio. Almost blinding. Among mirror plates and glass panes we move barefoot on a soft white wall-to-wall carpet. Not to worry, there is no broken glass. “I always say, no flurry around glass, it teaches us spotless cleanliness. One of my professor said: only bad glass breaks, the good one is cared.”

There is a final process, when the finest dust can be removed from the almost-ready object with hands only. For days I do not cream my hands, dried by soap and water, so at this important phase I leave no fingerprints on the object.

Machines and tools are in meticulous order. “I plough manically back a lot of money buying machinery and tools. The family is often wailing”. He contacts the grinding disc to the glass block with an elegant move. “At rough-cutting, using high speed, the tiny shards are bouncing. Safety glasses are obligatory. But to see the glass is not enough, you need to feel it”

Discoveries come with work. For example, the innumerable variations of the fan-like mirror layers. Rays are expanding, then narrowing.“ My largest fan object carried off gold medal at Kanazawa, out of 470 works of international artists. After all these years, numerous glass museums and galleries of the word know me as the ‘Fan man’”.

“In addition to the characteristic shape, these objects have a special inner life. Had I polished an object perfectly to shine, it would reflect disturbingly all from its environment. The silk-like light of the surface produces an inimitable inner life, and for this reason it is not purely a fan. I am inspired by the wings of the soaring birds, by the fins of fish, pebbles, leaves… A lot depends on the sensitivity, all the subtle flutter should be monitored for the nature is the greatest sculptor.”

“The title of a statue is never important to me. But, I am curious what the visitors are thinking on my objects on work. For example, a shell gave the inspiration for this object, but, making just exactly the same, it lacks the artistic value added. You may call it shell, but according to my otolaryngologist friend, it is a cochlea. “

“This is the thickest glass pane existing. It will be a backlit image. I perceive the glass as a liquid. I made several experiments on how is possible to call forth a water wave effect from the glass.“

“I need to polish by hand a lot, an error can be turned out at any time, so it is impossible to plan the time consumption. The deadline is my greatest enemy, because I have to work on a glass sculpture as much as the material and the surface requires. Recently, the airport taxi waited me at the front of the house until I finished the object for the London Plateaux Gallery exhibition. Even I left my due wardrobe at home, because at the final run I threw accidentally my dungarees into the suitcase.”

15/07/2011 Budapest

Prizes:

Kanazawa / 1. Prize (2010)

Habatat Gallery (USA) különdíj (2009)

Ferenczy Noémi díj (2002)

Sunshine outside. We are listening the emotional tenor of Bocelli: “Besame, besame mucho…” behind the lowered blinds, closing out the outside noise. Pale lamplight in the room. With closed eyes the 3D surround effect is stronger. We are here because of the loudspeakers.                                                                                                                                                            .

“Together with my girlfriend of delicious taste I renovated my flat. I purchased the best loudspeakers available. Returning home to the environment of carefully chosen furniture and colors, my lady only said: what do you want with this coffin?”

He had got the lesson: how to break out of the box form. He started to experiment with shapes and materials. The sphere is the most ideal shape, and the polyamide is the ideal material, a stone-like mixture, not resonating to the sound waves. High frequency tweeters are mounted into wooden lathe-work

For a loudspeaker, the main acoustic parameter is the volume in liters. A sphere size is increasing with 5 cm. The heart of a system is the cable and the crossover. The best ones are electroplated by 99.99 fine silver in the National Mint, the 99.98 fine is produced at a galvanizing workshop. A silver cable of 2-3 meter length can be 1-2 million Forints worth, produced by expert manufacturers abroad.

The membrane of a woofer/subwoofer is made of Kevlar, carbon, or ceramics. Inside the cabinet there are the amplifier, the passive elements of condensers and coils, and the crossover, all packed in soft material. The good loudspeaker has perfect linear characteristics, so giving back all sounds perfectly and flawlessly. It can be tested with computers using special microphones.

Capacity is given in watts, but the real frequency response is more important. “There are naughty companies, wanting to sell their low parameter devices. In this case they are advertising their product as excellent to home movie. We are few in the world being capable to exactly reproduce the original sound of musical instruments with high fidelity. Yes, we produce ‘high end‘ quality.”

“We are making unique objects of high technical content with unique design. When the hardware is ready, the enclosure gets an airbrushed priming cement layer, then we paint and polish it by hand. I did not think seriously first to utilize the Sistine Chapel fresco motifs, but, finally, a friend of mine, Kálmán Gasztonyi, painted two pieces of “The Creation”. Total surface of an enclosure is more than a square meter. Any texture can be prepared (leather, stone, rattan, mosaic, etc).”

When Prince made a concert here, a loudspeaker decorated with Hungarian traditional “matyó” pattern was put into his dressing room. After the show, he received it as a gift, to remember Hungary. Flowers on it were painted by fine lines by Zoltán Gut, a porcelain decorator.

The set of customers is diverse. Design and sound effects need to match to the flat. Hollows in the furniture are absorbing the sound, while the sounds are bouncing and interfering on the walls, if the room empty. As a key importance, the design must match to the flat, that is, that the housewife like it.

14/11/2013 Budapest

“The canoe slid on the water with quiet babbling. Approaching the shore, I bowed my head below the hanging branches… I cannot tell you how much the rare moments are missing while touring on the Tisza, the Sajó, and the Danube. “ After graduating at the university, everything suddenly changes. I realized that I lived before in chrysalis. I found myself to write down all.

First, what happened around me, and what the newspapers published, then what happened to me when an event happened, or what I was thinking about it. Pen sketches, made with the same obsession as the records, were paired one day.

I realized that this is a quest with me: where is the border between the picture-type thinking and the social awareness.

My diary is an interesting experiment as well in terms of how I can present my personal stories, just approaching the limit of intimacy.

Visiting an exhibition, I automatically look for works containing “writing inside the picture”. I was really surprised that this is my world. I had to experience our language limitations. Recently I appeared in a Zurich exhibition. There was in vain the exact translation beside my pictures, the audience badly received the Hungarian text.

The word is complicated, so I started to collect advices from others. Based these advices, I made 36 small pictures. These were made for three years. I think this series forms one work, because it reflects my grippings and the process of my life’s evolution. My favourite ones: “What is your goal? Find it!” and “Do not go to bed without getting yourself a fun that day!”

I brought four large circular pictures to an exhibition, but I wrote advices only for three, one was empty. The audience could vote for this fourth picture, and the best (for me) message was painted on the empty picture at the last three days. Thinking together mobilizes people.

If you do not keep a lookout, you are easily absorbed by a world that irrevocably excludes all other life. Without observing it, you would be a lazy movement on a well-constructed picture. Alike a pop-art collage presenting the US in the sixties, you can simply have a look around, and it will be clear: we are rocking on the waves of the fashion, having nothing common with the reality of today.

We need breakout points. I am looking for novelty even in the colors. I like off-color paints. I quest the color tunes for turquoise and peach. I usually browse Gaudí when I am looking for the shade summing up the whole together.

How is made up a picture? What happens if we rewrite an existing picture? If we reinterpret its every motifs? We simply appropriate the theme. The plate of King Matthias enlarged to two meter will not tell us much, but if you insert into the broken rim of a dial a quay, a girlfriend with bike, and a landscape with the Parliament in the background — well, we can observe the time and space together.

I selected this topic at the DSc school as well. Time and space would be just the theme of my three-year research. I think I should and could learn a lot. Now I work at the Amadeus Foundation studio, but starting in international projects cannot be excluded. I seek the company of good people, with whom I am in the same wavelength. I like to talk and to discuss. I observed that those being able to agree are the people to argue the most. After all, there is no reason to dispute with those who are ever harping on the same string?

6/5/2012 Budapest

“The afternoon wave reared me, the silky brillance of the sun shone across it. Sluggishly running over me, under its arc the time nearly stopped. When returning home from Greece, I knew how I made it of glass. The ‘I would like to live under blue wave’ was made of hot-fused and bended glass. If somebody fondles it, I know he likes it. .

My uncle dealt with glass, I liked his mastership, so there was no question what to choose, at 15, I entered to the polytechnics of glass industry. When the glass workshop of the College of Applied Arts was established, I was called to enter as instructor.

Initially I made beads and pendants by glass processing over gas jet. I was hardly able to keep a few. Then I dealt with polished jewelery and pins made of metal-vapourised mirrors by glueing. That time the Idea Co. exhibited them, selling a lot in several European countries.

Enlarging the pins, I made statuettes. For jewelery and later for statuettes, I applied first time the metal-vapourised glass. Glued together and polished, they seem to be a large jewel. When I made one, German, Dutch, Japanese galleries and private collectors grabbed at once.

The Neues Glass published an article on my mirror cube. Because of the very special internal reflections I considered it as a piece of my ouvre.

Having read this article, a French couple came to me. They figured the cube to themselves into their bathroom. I said I am unable to sell it. They said they would not depart without the cube, and when I could give a price, then they would double it. I decided several times to make a new one.

For the last seven years I am dealing hot-worked objects. Glass planes are cut first, melted together in furnace, then I polished and bended them in furnace into form. On this bended metal plate the mat-polished glass pane is cautiously heated up, 10-20 centigrade per hour. At 640 centigrade, the object neatly sinks into the form, and the heat gives to it a silk surface. Perhaps related to the personality, somebody likes the mirror-like surfaces, others do the soft forms. It is sure: collectors are different.

At one time I retired to my Balaton cottage, where I was polishing under the bird twittering. I am not tired of glassworking, on contrary, I enjoy it.”

He is managing the glass workshop of the MOME (University of Arts and Craft) since 1985. It is a pity that the furnace does not work for years, but they have a brand-new kiln.

It will be clear after diligent practice only that talent is coupled with ordinance in a student. Few remain in this field. After spending 42 years here I think if I have become known in a given genre, I must change. The glass is brittle and thankless, but a nice material in its kind. I really like.

28/4/2012 Budapest

“I clicked to this movement” – she responds quickly, and grabbing the bending figure at waist, she puts it to and fro with springy move. The other statue stands in idly staring posture. After the figure reaches a fixed position on the beam, the lazy posture of the other one changes with an acrobatic act. We are witnessing the beginning of a new story. .

Shifting forward its feet and waist, it is on the desiring watch with proud and easy gait. Pretending to be pokey, but it is very attentive. A few inches, and it pulls its weight to the wall, saying: I am strong, I am the best. The zealous restowing is inspiring, time passing away quickly…

This “creative house” was established using the support of Mr. Péter Balogh. Originally, there were social flats in the house, these were transformed into studios. In the framework of the Amadeus Foundation, young artists get the opportunity of free creative work. It serves as a solid fundament, but everyone shapes his/her destiny.

“ I was listed into the first group. We are different, but deep in our souls we are longing for a studio of own. I am a autonomous artist.

It came in handy that the metal workshop of the University was unexploited then, so I learned how to deal with the metal. First my father instructed me, but I learned to weld not from him. He grumbled: “Can you see? The cinder falls down!” when the welding slag was not worked out. To work with machines is always dangerous somewhat. On the wall there are photoes of my injuries. Be a warning sign to be more careful.

At the well-equipped computer corner we glance over her periods: her thesis, the angels of Giotto, urban anchors, steel cacti in series. “ I carried an iron cactus in my bag aboard a bus. When a passenger discovered, there was a confusion.”

My stories are made from materials of a garbage heap. Pieces of iron, steel plates, pipes, wires, cables… they are all from the refuse dump of a closed-down factory.”

Walking around Óbuda, we have overmuch of stories and experiences.” This sculpture is entitled Queen, maybe Inside or Outside, perhaps Loving… originally it was half a meter higher, but it could not get out the door” – it is a short but eloquent comment. Stately posture, crossed arms hold away the world. A dense scrub encircles her. Who knows when the Creator thought: this is enough! Perhaps when she ran out of strength, patience, and anger.

Lonely figures and embracing couples are nearly flying among the aura of wires. So spiritful, honest, and radiant. Forms are whirling, if need, walking on their hands. Jesting or seriousness? The movement is always touching, but somehow grotesque as well.

I am a sculptor, I cut my hair myself. It takes 3-4 days while I am happy with the shape. I use my Mac to see it from back, where I need to cut shorter. It succeeded short a bit now, and my head cold. At home, I am sleeping and wake up in iron poppy field. There is at the end of my bed” How can you live among this amount of iron? So, that she ensouled them.

21/4/2012 Budapest

I went to Gödöllő, to learn basketwork and rush matting. The place had a seducing spirit. Mari Nagy and István Vidák learned by watching then passed the tricks of the old masters working by traditions. Instead of the urban life and the use of ready-made factory stuff, the goal was to preserve the handicrafts. These young people were later named as ‘nomad generation’ “

Mari encouraged me to felt, but initially I did not want to make flat sheets. I saw first at an international exhibition, what can be made of felt. Rushed home, I made a bear, first of my life. Nowadays I am not nearly proud of it, as before. My favourite teddybear, Barnaby, was born later, the unique object of mine what I labelled.

My father was a painter, working a lot. I liked to watch him, even I liked the smell of the paints. I also wanted to be a painter; I frequented the drawing circle of Huba Bálványos, from him I received much encouragement, but I ceased to learn, becoming self-taught.

I worked as a retoucher in a printing office; in addition I made wool-spinning and weaving. I made coats from my products. I graduated in a study circle management course, and I taught weaving and felting in kindergartens, in schools, and in community centers. Around the 90s, I abruptly ceased to weave, and since then I am solely felting.

I have had three individual exhibitions. At one event I set up a glass pane. Ducks swam above, fish below, I made a spider-catcher first time. I was totally amused as a woman stopped and listed: bee-eater, green woodpecker, common tern, spider-catcher.

I have a considerable collection of books on birds. Once I wanted to make the all of birds, living in this country or crossing Hungary as migratory ones. In this case the originals would not be paraded by taxidermy. Why are these birds next to my heart? Because they are beautiful, flying free. This is my vulture; it is always with me when I go to fairs.

You could move these puppets. I had a lot of work making the „Hedgehoog Mother”, but I highly enjoyed when forming it by kneading. I hardly start to create a thick, hard-bodied puppet, because it completely exhaust my powers.

I am known from my “White Duck”. It is clearly not a goose, having a short neck. You need to distribute the wool fibers evenly and neatly, to achieve retentivity.

The wool is shrinking because of hot water, and you need to knead it to put together the fibers. Not everyone understands why I love „dabbling” and the plenty of soap. It is simple. It is a lot of pleasure for me that objects, birds are formed by my hands from the wool.

At the fairs those women buying my mousseline silk scarves want to be special, and appreciate the natural materials. I have many stories on celebrities, but I do not like to brag about it. Well, I will tell you one.

Before Christmas I was invited to a TV studio. While waiting my turn after the interviews of a ceramist and a cake-maker, Iván Fischer, the famous music conductor arrived, and saw my Firebird. “I need it” – he said, but I might not give it to him, because I needed it for the interview. “You can come for it in the Christmas Fair at the Vörösmarty Square, if you want”, I replied. It was a very good feeling when he appeared at the fair together with his son. He just asked the little one: “Will it be good?” The little fellow nodded: “Good!!”

Just on time, excitement at the top. The furnace is working! Ventilator blades are energetically beating. Across the open windows, grouser furnace inviting. Masters and teachers gather, crossing the pipe network and security devices, while students of glass-working major are arriving in strict schedule.                                                                        .

It is a frequent question: how many furnaces are active in Hungary? Apart from the ones at the Ajka Crystal plant, perhaps 4-5 furnaces of professional scale are working. One of them is here, at the School. Limited by the financial resources, it is heated up for a week – 10 days, two times per semesters. Smelting runs in full night, to produce the next day material.

The task is mold-blowing. Molds are designed and produced by the students. Everybody is stained of oil and graphite. If plaster molds are smeared with the mix of oil and graphite, the glass will not stick to the mold, so it is reusable. But, it is smoking furiously, they work in pair, one needs to fan while blowing, meanwhile the mold must be kept strongly by the other, who then has to open it at the right time. The first piece is not perfect yet, but the experience will be unforgottable.

Emi has covered the mold of his first jug with graphite. „That will be the evil, this one the goodness“, he shows, waiting hardly the minute when his turn arrives. A friendly glassmith will realise his works. The gaffer worked decades in Tokod. There were produced the famous Unicum bottles. After 112 glorious years the famous glass factory became bankrupt and closed in 2004.

This time James Carcass acts as the second blowmaster. Attention is steady. This is the event when the cream of the glass art masters are gathering. They devotedly help the enthusiastic students. They are bouncing questions to each others as well, answers arrived on the spot, what they tried to do and what they learned. The atmosphere is enviable. Real professional workshop.

At lunchtime, the brave students attack the blowpipes. First, they get a blob on the end of the pipe, the next layer can be spooled when the blob cools down a little. The molten glass is ‘gathered’ on to the blowpipe in much the same way that honey is picked up on a dipper. And, it is free to try to blow a small air into the gather. Máté exploits every minutes. Sitting on the bench, he wraps in turning, forming and blowing the glass. He takes a liking to the glassblowing, and he surely has something in his mind.

In every movement of Eszter we see the well-trained dance steps. Glassblowing surely needs a good sense of rhythm. The blob is moving erraneously, she tries to balance it with pleasure, paying attention to prof. Borkovics, who just dropped in with his lunchbag. She imagines her life around the furnace, because she enjoys it, the glass is marvellous, and there is a lot of creativity.

24 hours more, and the objects can be removed from the kiln. Some will be perfect, others a little deceiving. Joy and disappointment. Fortunately, there are the excellent foregoers for stimulation, those living and dying for their profession will not leave the grievings to oneself.

Thanks to Krisztina Kecskés, Kristóf Bihari, Balázs Sipos, Péter Borkovics and James Carcass for the explanations, and thanks the students for their introduction.

5/4/2012 Budapest

During the Now Rous, the Iranian New Year, everybody goes crazy for two weeks. As a custom, they plant wheat, then they put the young wheat-crop in boxes on the car roof. When starts, the box falls down, and the green covers the streets. We lived in Iran for years. Instead of Easter bunny, they buy gold fish. These are swimming in glass jars at home, in the office and in shops. The fish is the symbol of rebirth and luck. Even beans are in fish form. Passing in their hand the loosely fixed small plates, faithful people burble “Allah Aqubar” when walking.

“I was inspired by the nomad and dervish jevellery. We followed some tribal families, so we knew their lives. I collected all sorts of objects: spoons, harnesses at a flea market, full of fine pieces. There is a particular plant at the stony desert. Sticking out its head from the soil, it shows to the treasure hunters where is an ancient burial site with figurines, buckles perhaps.

I graduated at the University of Arts and Crafts as dress designer. Just after graduation, almost as student, I was awarded for designing a complete outfit. I am textile-oriented in the jewelery as well. Actually, I weave my jewelry, just like a chain-armour. I have developed a special procedure: beans are strung in spiral form, and then applied to the base motif.

I cannot get bored with so many beautiful stones and beads around. Amber can be so much different: yellow of countless shades, or the red ones. The name of the green one is ‘angur’, grape. These are melted and pressed of tree resin. You can test it simply with a match: the genuine will not melt.

For the first time, we brought home several carpets by chance. The nomadic hand-woven rugs of Persia always have a defect, for only Allah can be perfect. We found some cradles as well, made of leather or homespun. You can imagine of what condition. When they were moving in the desert, they put the baby in it, using no diapers.

A trendy lady of Iran does not wear nomadic jewelery, only gold. At home she follows the western chic. She will not buy traditional rugs, only city style ones of perfect quality and of strong patterns. The traditional, low-key carpet will not fit to her taste.

The Iranian woman has a thick, luxuriant black hair, so if her neck flashes out, it is highly erotic. Once in the amusement park I had only one tuft hanging off from my scarf, and the guardsman observed. The women contiuously make an effort to ease the strict dress codes. They put a huge rose on the tip of their heads, so the scarf on their foreheads is swinging upward. The jackets are streamlined, nipped-in, over the pant a miniskirt is pulled.

Ladies compensate themselves with rich make ups, fine balsams, beautiful underwears. Iranian women can work, if wearing chadoor or at least scarf. They can have driver’s licence, and they are strong drivers. They have equal rights at least in the street traffic, and they use their rights. “

An exceptional world, feminine tricks, good luck amulets, a message of eternity, perhaps a pure esthetic experience. Only a tale, what the ladies could understand only.

25/3/2012 Budapest

Born as Pintér, he but wanted another, particular family name. As a wolf growls out of the forest: “Wa-Horn!” Even at the age of 16 he signed his paintings in this way. Images with caption. There were family members engaged in drawing seriously, but he did not learn from them, everything comes from his instinct. His strongest instinct is the sexuality, therefore his pictures tell on this.                                                                                                                                                                            .

“In 1990 I felt to finish my job in Hungary.” That time in Vancouver the cultural issues were the lesbianism, the AIDS, and the oppression of blacks. And the American galleries apply the mainstream.

They angrily rejected the traditional sexuality. “ For me, there is no compromise in art. The art is about the freedom. Even my own ego must not override what I am making. Be the mouse tail a little longer, if it looks better.”

I went to New York, there happens my culture, the future is boiling there. Miles Davis, Jimmy Hendrix started there. At home, I read American literature, the “Apocalypse Now “ told me more than the Hungarian movie the “Cold Days”. Listening blues, I was not interested in the ethnic dance revival movement.

I had to realize that I had to learn English to explain my pictures. I can not be successful without speaking the language of art. The visitor wants to read even at the entrance what is to see. Without this he does not enter. As Tom Wolfe tells in “The Painted Word”, the public is not satisfied with their own experience; rendering of pictures is not enough.

The Klasky-Csupo studio has a great prestige. ‘The Simpsons’ started here. There is a keen competition for a well-paid post, even if the owner himself invites you. In this Hollywood cartoon studio the background drawing people manages the pen in a soft way. “ I had to learn how the lines are fluttering”

We worked solely according to the instructions of the art director. Sometimes I could not resist myself, and I wrote “Wahorn” on the licence plates. I was informed that they hunted for them. I received a warning.

“In Los Angales there is not much energy. What the others made in a day, I accomplished in two hours. The remaining time I drew on post-its. I returned home with ten thousand post-it plates. Said, it is a diary, but not. My daughter called me back.”

“The world changed. The computer won at all. I was learned. For a while I was the webmaster of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Arriving the new media, the time of the paint plus material expired. Not long ago, if you wanted to see what is not at home, you hung up a painting, to be looked for a lifetime. You needed the masters. Today the designers serve the demands. I realized I am not an avant-garde anymore”

“I feel good in the music. Even if painting, I think of the drums of the Siberian shamans. The stretched canvas on the wall absorbs the vibrations of the soul. The energy freezes inside forever. Looking at the paintings and feel vibrating together with the canvas, you will love the picture.” He puts some pieces of timber on the fire. This wood remained of the shed-and-studio, burned down. The rebuilt, spacious part of the house has clay-plastered walls; a single iron stove can heat up.

It could be talked more on the rural tranquility. In the field, transformed to helicopter landing place, Bátor the dog run up and down. “ I plant vegetables only. Last year I had beetroot of such a size. The work in the garden makes me moving well. In the city I would never leave the house.”

15/3/2012 Mezőszemere

Díjak: /State awards: Munkácsy díj (1993) Magyar Köztársasági Érdemrend lovagkeresztje (2007) Elérhetőség: www.wahorn.com

Ephemerity or revival: these remain a mystery. What does it mean an eye closed into the dead material, the other opened a little out of the eyelid? The awakening to consciousness, or the quiet acquiescence to our fate, that the things around us are disappearing, then being re-created again. Everybody wears a mask. This recognition is incident to the cognition of ourselves. So our personality contains our mask.

In the ancient cultures, at the time of the Inca and Eastern empires, masks had symbolic, cultic meaning. The spiral of snail is the symbol of the soul, gold means Sun, the Sun itself is the life and knowledge.

This pattern was copied from a tree-trunk. I use prints of real foils and characteristic weeds. I can not resist the Sheperd’s purse, its special structure. This dried melon peel was found at the tip of a pole in Croatia. I am carving the sealing patterns from chamotte-foam bricks.

According to the tradition, specialisation always belonged to the pottery. They were the jar-makers and plate-makers, and so on. Generally, ceramic artists do have their feature articles. My favourites are the masks and the wicker plates.

As I think, an arts and crafts ceramic should bear some other grounds than the simple usefulness, it must give more than the pure function. Around the village of Veresegyház I have a secret spot to gather willow wickers. I need these wickers to make the handles of plates.

I use clay with chamotte. It is well-formable and can be fired without problem

The objects covered with glaze containing metaloxides are taken from the kiln in red-hot, then buried into sand, mixed with wood chips. Wood blazes up, but, lacking the air, it is depriving the oxides of the oxygen to burn. In this way the pure metal, usually copper, appears on the surface of the objects. We need to wait several minutes before uncovering. These minutes are the most nervous and exciting ones…

Honestly, I am happy to fire together with Éva Kun. It is a great to share with someone the joy of surprise immediately. While we have a practice of several decades, we can not ever be sure in advance what colours are generated and where. The raku itself is magic! The magic of the raku is is effective both on greater surfaces and on smaller objects, even if it is a vase for one flower or a cornucopia. Sometimes we are screaming with delight.

11/3/2012 Budapest

In 1976 I was called up to the Taszár base. I suffered a year in the barracks, but there was the football. One day I broke my leg while playing. The commander saw me limping at the end of the line, so he transferred me to the Balatonkiliti Airstrip as radio operator. We were three there, no any airplane.The other two studied for archeology, they dug all days. The real archeologists were annoyed, for they were not allowed to enter heavily guarded military zone. As for me, I drew and painted. I got a nice year.

My father was painter and sculptor. I learned everything by watching him. I also wanted to be a painter, but I did not learn well enough, so I could not enter to the Art College. What is more, I was from the baby boom, so we were too many

I liked and imitated the painting of Ignác Kokas, and the surrealism of Dalí and Max Ernst. Wanting something big, I painted a five-meter canvas. I felt this was not enough for me. I wanted to step into the three-dimensional space. In 1984 I found an abandoned quarry in the Balaton Highlands, near Diszel. I made a scaffolding the curved concrete wall of a silo, and among the trees the five-meter draft was spread. This was the ‘Visions’. This completed my surrealist era. In 1987 I went to France.

Paris opened the world of hundred variations for me. I had no special ambitions; I wanted to paint. I travelled a lot. Even now I prefer to live in Bretagne at the seashore. But, I had to live on something; I produced floral still life paintings of Dutch style for a landscape trader. He suddenly disappeared, surely finding a cheaper source of supply in China.

Living abroad, I realized that French people are the same as others. The Hungarians have more vitality.

In France, finally, I got powder tempera paint, while only ArtFund members got this at home. I prepare myself my tempera after the recipe of grand old painters. Using this, it is more pleasant than oil. The tempera produces as clear colors as water, I can paint multiple layers, and it is deletable.

What do I paint? I make fictious prints on the memory of Earth. Signs, drawings, what the caveman scribbled. What will remain after us? Traces and bones, after the excavation. My figures are etched into the still plastic, rude cement surface. The sign of totem, what I use on pictures and sculptures, evolved slowly. This is my logo, my totem.

I paint on plywood. Two meters long, just to pass through the door. My statues are made of concrete, but dismountable. Transportability is a must, I lived in the 4th floor in Paris, and now in Budapest as well, without elevator.

In 2007 I moved back, bringing home my pictures and sculptures. I had a great exhibition in the B55 Gallery. By a friend of mine, I got in touch with a Frenchman, who purchased almost everything. So many objects of mine returned to France. These wanted to live in France, where were born. Interesting. “A work of art must have its way and fate!”

25/2/2012 Budapest

He galopped out of the court of the damned house. In the outskirts of the tiny Serbian village he glimpsed a wolf, crawling out from a swale in hurry, then disappearing. There was a pale sticking out of the ground. The vampire was stabbed in the chest with this pale. With grave glance Marquis d’Urfé left off speaking for a while in the house of Earl of Schwarzenberg’s widow, in the night after a scientific meeting in 1815, while the audience watched with excitement and skepticism the mysterious history of the escape from the family become vurdalak. (Based on the story of Alexey Tolstoy)

Pushkin wrote a poem on the cemetery meeting of Vanya and a vurdalak. According to beliefs (as Wikipedia says), it is possible to transform to vurdalak (werevolf) on Wednesday or Friday night, at full Moon, when the moonshine casts on the man’s face.

„The sculpture ’Vurdalak’ was given a name by Vera Varga, art historian. She said: ’This is like the Moon implanted into a wolf, or, as if the wolf swallowed the Moon’. On contrary to my wife (Margit M. Tóth, glasswork artist), I never give a name to my sculptures in advance, and I never write the title on them. While I create the woman’s shape realistically, my animals get their form in the way of progress.”

„One morning a German shepherd dog came to our yard. It wanted to live with us. There was nothing to do: we lodged it. Baba, the two months tike already my choice.”

Four kilns are lined up at the wall. “We use so much for practical purposes, being switched according to the sizes of the molds. In the big one a molding just cooled down. No, it is not blue, it is violet, the neon light changes the tint.

Then follows a lengthy process of grinding and polishing. The casting is never perfect. He does not care the bubbles and inclusions; they definitely fit into the concept.

“When I needed to select my secondary school, I thought: whatever but learning, so I selected body ironer. When I was 16, I started to frequent the Dési-Huber Art Circle to draw. A friend of mine invited there, he dismissed, I was stuck. I selected the major in the Academy of Arts and Crafts in a similar way: where was required the least amount of technical knowledge. So I came into contact with the glass.”

Where did the constructivist influences come from? He enumerates a long line of lovely stories on Uncle Pál, Uncle Jenő, Uncle Béla. When talking with a member of the Szentendre Artist Community, we need to know that they are the famous masters of art: Deim, Barcsay, Czóbel. You do not have to guess long, just to look around. Recently he paints again. The pleasant smell of the linseed oil hovers around the green pig, the domesticated vurdalaks, and the fabulous figures of our word of beliefs.

10/2/2012 Csobánka

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