„Herend, the porcelain manufacture itself a magic of 185 years. Full of non-documentable and manual knowledge, inherited by the generations. Famous porcelain factories abroad are closed down in succession, it is difficult to survive. One of the best known and most practicised classical technique of Herend Porcalain Manufacture is plate-tracery. This was the base of form and decor design of my tea and coffee sets. Design became prototype, then line production, having been produced even now.

I was the art director of Herend for three years – she begins in calm, friendly voice – it was a good decision to develop the porcelain version of the famous Gömböc* The décor of the unglazed porcelain Gömböc was designed with the help of the inventors, Gábor Domokos and Péter Várkonyi. Calculations, equations and formulas required to the unique form turn into pen-drawn calligraphies, telling us their own creation story. The Gömböc of Herend became a business gift, an object of meditation, a Hungarian intellectual innovation in all respect. “

*’Gömböc’ is a convex three-dimensional homogeneous body which, when resting on a flat surface, has just one stable and one unstable point of equilibrium.

„To work with porcelain means for me like to write a sonnet, full of definitives. My activity splits to object design and sculpture. The porcelain is a clean but sensitive material, it deforms, quickly cracks, requires high temperature in firing. Even if there is a speck of iron on it, its value decreasing.”

Along the wall, bright green leaves are peeping out from a box. At the end of last summer, a tree, 3.5 m high, having fireclay branches was applied to the wall of the school in Vép. Birds and leaves were made of porcelain. Combined application of various ceramic materials and techniques resulted in its title: “Contrasts”.

The furnace is insulated by kaowool, a material tested by space technology. At its side, some kindergarten signs. “The OviArt, a sign system for nurseries and kindergartens, is my recent development, consisting of more than 100 elements. Not only an aesthetic pleasure but practical to use as well.”

Large elements, large movements. Snakes with platinum-painted geometric patterns are dancing, made by plaster-mould casting procedure. These can be used as framing to fruits.” Arriving to the fruits. “The Wave Bowl is usually presented with a nice green apple on it. Some issues have a particular concern of me. Until successful walking around it, I will not carry on. The “Snake dance” series created in this way, and then the “Wave” collection built and extended over the years.

“Towers, towns, dwellers. The row of the collapsing buildings is an apocalyptic adventure. The smoky skyscrapers could be the memorials of the Ground Zero. Warnings how vulnerable we are.”

“I started to experiment with simple, featureless elements. I guessed whether the random stacking of the squares and changing their number could alter the denotation. I like these constructions, their meshwork and transparency hold me spellbound. You can feel the air embraced by the thin porcelain”

“Plates are glued together with the same material. Selecting the thickness and the construction itself can perfectly control, how it collapses, how it becomes separated, how the movement stops. Even the first piece was exactly what I imagined. Must be careful, for the porcelain becomes soft at 1400 centigrade, reaching the glass phase.”

Contemplating on these objects, we are thinking on who live in each cube. Sometimes there are friendly colours, velvety blues. As we guessing, she gives away: “The small buildings symbolise people. The citizens of the city are the singles and the couples. Recently at an exhibition, I built a whole city of 500 buildings”

My recent project is the recycling of porcelain waste. Producing a new material, lamps and objects were constructed, shown at the Museum of Applied Arts.

4/2/2012 Budaörs

Ferenczy Noémi Prize (2005.)

Read more:
www.babospalma.hu

www.oviart.hu

He passionately collects paper. „The paper itself signifys miracle. I always visited even the next-door tobacco shop, because the tobacco paper is fine, strong and sometimes has an interesting pattern. One day, receiving something quite special, the tobbaccoonist called me. Sheets of parchment papers were bound to miniature books. Turning then paging two books facing each other, they stuck together that I could never pull them apart.

For me, this was a symbol of the human relations. An idea of a series emerged in me: the Books of Destiny. A next-door lawyer just wanted to throw away her outdated collection of laws. I used them first.

As the pages and letters touch each others then separate, a new story is formed. Just as a relationship between two people. Intertwined personal tragedies, woundings, and burnings can be later dissolved visibly. Then, what is exciting, you are unable to read the original text anymore.

When founding the title of this series, I did not realised that this was a very serious thing. One day, entering a second-hand bookshop, I directly went to a shelf. Absent-mindedly I started to read a book. Its author Eric Berne, was a psychologist, investigating the „transaction analysis”, and he wrote a whole series with the title „Books of Destiny”.

The wall of the studio is filled with books, what he illustrated, or (at least) he designed theit covers. It is no wonder that he has a special link to the book, almost all the same to an old novel or to an outdated phone book. Not to talk about the covers.

“One day we drove to Révfülöp from Veszprém. Wheatfields gleamed yellow, red of the poppies marked out from the wheat. The sweeping picture induced by the motion challenged my interest.”

I made a painting by using the same technique of the artistic books the serie of “Book-Landscapes”. I was amazed that it was possible to reach such a high resolution, that nobody could reach before in another way. It is true, anyway, that I needed the edges of 1200 sheets cut

You can make anything from paper. “Folding is great” – as he wrote in his book, revealing the secrets of origami. Most people enthuse over the frog even now. But, to our greatest sorrow, we could not meet the rabbit of nearly 2 meter high, what he folded from cardboard for an exhibition.

5/1/2012 Budapest

Munkácsy-prize

If someone is a ’plein air’ painter, so he has an outdoor studio under the sun, then make an excursion. Beautiful autumn, perhaps there were never so miracously colorful the landscape around the small farmsteads in the South Lowland region. .

Struggling with the bush, we follow a vanished path defending ourselves from the shoulder-high stinging-nettle and trying to cross the heaps of mulberry tree branches. Everything is either biting or stinging, there is nothing to grasp.

One house has already been strangled by the vigorous lianas, another house nearby: „This spring this was visitable, I hoped that it would not collapse until I arrive. But also this one is crumbled, totally ruined. I am not interested in ruins, I wonder the very last minutes before turning to end.

Visiting the scattered homesteads in this region „Kiskúnság” we can study the last phase of the 100 years old country life. For the region is characterized by small patches of forests and fields, these farms survived the forced organisation of „cooperatives”.

“Due to external economic constrains, the self-sufficiency sentenced to death today. Being a thriving economical unit fifty years ago, instead of the five horses suddenly only one was in the barn, and now even the large wine barrels are empty around the house. “

“Along the farm row of Kecel-Tüskös mainly Slovaks lived. They decorated their orange-purple colored houses with rolling patterns. You can see here: they tested several patterns on this wall. In the sixties, maybe? The Swabians (German settlers) applied other colors, but the need of the civil culture can be seen everywhere.

The Felsőbánya cemetery is on a hillside above the town, the Catholic and the Protestant separately. Below the picturesque huge chestnut trees there are the tombstones even from the years of 1700-1800. Among them: the thick, soft pillows of moss. The breeze gently blows their thin sprigs. One day a truck came and collected the cast iron tombs. Hopefully, the stones will remain.

The painter is full of the historicity and the perpetuation of the last remaining values. Perhaps this is why he paints aquarelles, based on sight, as the old itinerant painters did.

You must be present, so you can be authentic, inspired by the scene. The old market town house is uninhabited. Tomorrow it gets the table: for sale. The new owner will come, demolishing it, and a story as well as an era disappears. There is a new world next door: a white-painted iron gate.

What is the source of the artist’s urge? Perhaps the sense of the deficiency…

14/12/2011 Monor

It was 1st of April, the Fools’ Day. Just waiting friends at home, the phone rang. Calling from the Hotel Hilton, the person insisted that he was the secretary of Robert Redford. I thought it was a joke. Redford filmed in Budapest together with Brad Pitt.Later I heard they moved to the Castle Hill because of the endless harassments.

Edit Lőrincz, the interior stylist of the hotel filled the rooms with my vases. Redford had them packed up and took it all. I got an hour to meet with the actor. I did not go to the hotel referring to our guests, but in fact I had no courage. I was enrolled to the high school as glasswork drawer, but they wrote ‘glasshouse drawer’ into my certificate. I imagine myself as I sit in a greenhouse, and I draw…

My life started in a back room-and-kitchen flat. From the smog-dimmed gallery hardly entered the light, and the time passed unobserved. Even the indoor plants could not outlive. That time I made my vases of corn leaves form.

“The twelve years that I spent there established my way. I do not think that there is an intuitive artist. I am thinking in systems. Having planted a tree, I watered the seedling then pruned the branches, while the others ate already the fruit.”

She could choose several directions. She can produce a colored glass pane without lead lining, or represent the minimalist style, so trendy nowadays (see this vase with blades of grass).

Craving for Szentendre, I moved back to there, to the green ambience, where you can be soaked with the Nature. If there is no flora around us, we are suffering. We cure ourselves with small gifts, women wears flowered dresses, pinning stamina and stigmas into their hair. We desire the primary adventures, what the city steals of us. Our nerves will not tolerate the destructive and secondary urban atmosphere, we will rise against it.

We don’t blow the glass here. When working, no philosophy, because there is the glass. You could see neither the color because it is glowing red, nor the form because it is soft and moving. When cool, you can see whether it is a successful child, or like grandfather: great ears, but still lovely.

My toolbox, my dentist’ bag is always at hand, containing the all-important tools, pliers, and so on. This is my working glove, the other is the Sunday best. I always accept right-handed leather glove.

The recent vintage is fairly rich, decorated by poppies, plums, cherries, grapes, magnolias, clematises… “ I am aspiring to that the form do not be static, regular. On the end, all objects get a patina in a molten tin bath, to bring together the colors.”

Winter is for charity activity. Her postcard-collages represent the same accuracy, entirety, love and liveliness, as her glass objects. Meanwhile I imagine the young woman, who desired very much for a bicycle, and when Santa Claus brought a snow-white bike, she immediately started to ride in the ice-covered City Park…

7/12/2011 Szentendre

Díjak:

Ferenczy Noémi-díj (1996)

“I intended this glass bathtube object for my wife as wedding present, but I had no time to finish. About two years after, it happened to get into my hands again. I do not sense it was to be done as planned. That this object does not contain sexual thoughts, geishas are bathing in the glass bathtube.

I graduated at the University of Applied Arts in 2003. Immediately I found a job at the Ajka Glass Factory as designer. That time the factory was inquired to design and produce a glass horse, as a prize object of the “Prima Primissima” celebration (a yearly gala to decorate the most outstanding public achievement in Hungary). This was my first job.”

In this way I succeeded to establish a casting workshop inside the plant. The major customer of this workshop is the Fabergé company. We produced glass figurines for them, the most popular was the “bull and bear”, the icon of the bankers. A real banker must have one on his desk. Objects produced by the Ajka Crystal Works are typical manual products of craftsmanship even now.

After two years he left Ajka. Since then he works for companies commissioned. He continuously gets orders to design and create award objects.

A year ago he bought and furnished this workshop. His technology is the casting, that is, the lost-wax (“cire perdue”) procedure.

“This is just like a bronze foundry. I can totally utilize my industrial experience.” This refers not only to the technology and the materials but to the negotiations with the partners on images, deadlines, financial items as well.

The workshop was furnished for the ‘cold’ technology, for there is a demand.

At the university there was an other attitude. The so-called studio glass means experimental art there, for him, it is different. The basic difference is that while the randomness, even a technological breakdown is fitting into the experimental work, he must refine the given technology until the imagined and designed result come up exactly. Therefore, he does not conceal anything what he learned.

He investigates the method to specifically shape of the inside and outside forms. What we can see from this, 5-6 % is for the design, the other part is skilled works. He works in mind even for a year. Why ‘Suzy’ keeps up her hand, why the dog is swallowing the man? The answer: the candy dish needs a lid!

28/11/2011 Budapest

At home it was feared there would be a scandal. I spent the third month in Moscow. That was the strict time of the Brezhnev rule. It was a cold winter, and we lived in a poorly heated dorm. In 1977, I won a one-year scholarship to the Surikov Moscow Institute of Art together with a sculptor. Every day I went to the studio at the corner of the Red Square, I got neither canvas nor paint, of course.                                                     .

Turkmens lived in our neighboring rooms. ‘Try to make linocuts, we give you material and tools’. (I had similar friendly gestures in other times as well). I never made linoprint before; I did not like it, I found so dry and dull. Always a rude Derkovits linoprint on György Dózsa came to my mind. I had not the slightest intention to make linocuts, but I could not do against it. Standing in front of a mirror, I managed to force myself to cut a self-portrait, resembling me somehow.

Working on the linocut, I got the trick of it, I enjoyed the fine thin lines and the large black surfaces. According the old technique, lines indicate the space; the grafitto process applies several layers, scraping back the upper layer where necessary.

It quickly became clear that they know everything about me. To test the system, I told Sasha, Natasha and the other girls amazing and unthinkable things just for kidding. They were very lovable, but, as it turned out, all of my words were passed on.

The tension grew in my soul. At home, they were informed as well. That time Dora Kogan, an art historian from the Soviet Union was studying Csontváry at Pécs, and when she returned, she brought me a suitcase of powder paints. My friends, sending the paints said that there were no problems to recognize me: my fur-coat were unmistakable. The train arrived. All passengers leaving, I stood on the platform in my traditional lace-patterned suede fur-coat. And the elegant lady came to me directly.

“You’re not a typical socialist painter!” – the depertament chef of Lenin head said angrily when reading my applications. For this reason, I never saw the Ermitage in Leningrad.

What is the socialist painting? I never knew it.

An antique shop owner asked the city’s artists to draw pictures of horses. I made 5-6 sketches (“croquis”) when horses moving. In return, I asked these old frames. I restored them, smearing with golden paste.

I work in the old artist’s settlement of Szentendre. At the end of October I move to Budapest, but in spring, of course, I return to Szentendre as soon as possible.

It is a good to smudge the fibreboard! When starting, memories are returning and the fantasy starts. It occurs to me my childhood memories, taking shape the old ladies of headkerchiefs, or the gadgets on the wall of our summer kitchen, revealing the lights and shadows…

22/11/2011 Budapest

Around the inner glass object an outer shell of glass is constructed. This is basically what we could catch from the secret on the so-called diatreta (“double layer”) glass.

“I started my experiments when the National Museum of Hungary, Budapest requested me to make a copy of their diatreta vessel. Only 12 pieces of that type of glasses remained in the world.”

Supposed that these Roman glasses were produced between the 2 and 4th century, and perhaps only one family knew the secret how to make.

“ First I experimented with the letters for weeks. The text around was ancient Greek: ‘Drink and devote to the pastor’ ”

The toothed rim was preceeded by much work as well. The original is sophisticated and complete, so it is a challenging task even with the today’s technological developments.

It was his work for a half year. His energy was depleted by the many experiments and the full devotion. Despite the delicate instruments, one wrong move and a piece of lacy tooth is broken. Fragments were flying. Sanding the bowl, I needed to cool it with water to prevent being ruptured by the heat. The copy finished is in the museum.

So far, I made several hundred fusing. This mood lamp is my diploma piece. It is here because we change the halogen lamp to LED. It is special because of the elongated flames. The furnace needs a special attention. The wire, suspending the object, becomes longer, and there will be a completely different form in seconds.

His life is full of excitement. Accidentally, the form, planned to be geometric, became dented. If bubbles occurred when heating, you can be happy or sorrowful.

“The spaghetti glass is pulled from hot glass. Its quality depends on minutes. If nearly invisible bubbles are inside, the shine will be different. “ It is a decorative element, he prefers to use it, but no doubt, very sensitive.

His brandy glasses of guaranteed exclusiveness, every piece needs a unique mold, because the plaster molding material shall be broken up, otherwise the glass produced will not come out. Every piece of the delicate glass, coming from the broken or chipped objects, is carefully retained.

He struggles with the fine lacy teeth; he works stones of materials into the glass table pane of one-and-half meter long, travelling among three workshop, his head is full of new ideas, experimenting, working, teaching… and yet, he is eager to change the subjectof conversation to praise his colleagues of craft arts

11/11/2011 Budapest

Read more: www.borkovics.hu
KANAZAWA EXHIBITION OF GLASS (2013) “Honorable Mention” prize (see winners: http://www.glassismore.com/core/projects/104/user_files/records/10/55/glass2013_prize.pdf )

As a child, I learned to play violin. My teacher held the tip of his knife under my elbow, to keep the perfect position. So I finished the music. I loved drawing, dismantling-assembling, any work of mechanic. In this way, logically, I went to the engineering polytechnics, later to the College of Applied Arts, where I graduated as industrial designer.

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In my high school time, as well as in my college time I worked in a locksmith’s workshop. My old master was forced to move three times, finally he gave up the business, offering me to take over his workshop. In this way my designer activity gradually transformed to handicraftmanship.

As a member of the National Art Foundation, I designed and produced various objects, for example, a lamp series. For a while it worked smoothly, but later I realized that the design is not my world.

To restore something has more manual work. I enjoy the integrated problem-solving jointly with architects, with experts in heritage monuments as commissioners. If the original is not exist, we talk over the style, the proportions, the technical solution, then I prepare it.

At the reconstruction the president’s palace at Budapest I could produce the historical coat of arms of Hungary, and lamps, and inscriptions. For the Klotild Palace we made lamps, for the Tihany Benedictine Abbey banisters, locks, grilles. I have orders continuously, either renovation or production of authentic copies.

The most exciting objects are the locks. I met interesting and ingenious constructions. The largest one was 30 cm about. I have private costumers as well. Those buying a country house need authentic fittings, but for a new, modern building they order elaborate wrought iron or locksmith pieces.

A major problem in renovation of old lamps is to obtain lampshades. For these beautiful Art Noveau chandeliers I managed to find accessories. These are interesting rarities. To move up and down, there is a pole in the middle.

Lot of things is to be amazed in his workshop. A drill stand, operated with weights instead of springs.

And an old manual press, and a metal pressure pad in the corner. These produce the metal cones of the lampshades. Need strength and endurance.

“I was hoping that one of my sons followed me. Instead, they became an architect, a trumpeter, a pianist. At one time I taught at the Technical School of Göd, maybe there would be pupils who capable of receiving my mastership. For about ten years, I had apprentices here in this workshop, but all defected except one.

But, the grandchildren! I have twelve grandchildren. One, thirteen years of age, is a summer-time apprentice in my workshop. He could be ten, when we got a cartoon series of his, entitled “Four Season”. When we asked the nine-year old other, what he would like to be, he answered: “I want to be a smith, or a violinist, so live long, grandfather, please!”

28/10/2011 Budapest

My sweeties! Come in!” After a friendly hug, he briskly leads us to the narrow stairway of satin-polished wood. When up, we kick off our shoes at a wardrobe, camuflaged as a giant machine.                                                        .                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       .

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Following us, his granddaughter, Julcsi arrives rejoicing: „My permanent teeth is coming, Sweety!” The studio is really a study room as well, lot of technical gadgets, touchscreens, a desk and documents. But what documents! The more importants are arranged to a collage: the locksmith master certificate, faded newspaper sheets, a certificate that he did not shot to the ’counter-revolutionaires’ at the 1956 Revolution, a diplom for excellent voluntary activity, and memorabilities of the non-communist era after 1990. „ I finished this table after the Kossuth Prize” – he said.

„I found this playing card in the street, when I worked in Berlin as DAAD fellow. Starting from this moment, the luck and myself were together. That day a couple appeared, they wanted to buy two pictures of me. They did not understand that I wanted to give one of the pictures free. He was the owner of the Storck Chocolate Company with his wife of aristocrat origin. In Berlin I sold all of my paintings. Returning home, we (Éva and myself) were able to extend our house.”

Szűkösen, de sok munkával jutott egy tetőtérre. Az ideálisnál jóval alacsonyabbra futotta. Hétrét görnyedve járkáltunk. Mikor Demszky és Magyar Bálint látogatóba jöttek, zsörtölődtek is: Biztosan azért csináltad, hogy hajlongjunk előtted. „Ezen a lukon másztam át ide. Befért egy ágy és a végébe az íróasztal. Egy nap az egész ház mienk lett és a tetőt is magasabbra ácsoltuk!“

A Magyar Festészet Napja ünnep számunkra, itt megtoldódot egy nem várt programmal. Ekkora gyűjteményt még sehol nem láttunk. A ház minden rejtekében a legnagyszerűbb kortársak alkotásai. Minden milliméter felületet kihasználva: legalább kétszáz festmény. De a lélegzetünk eláll a sok kisplasztikától is. „Nem fér több! Csak ezért nem tudom a többi sok száz művész barátom munkáját begyűjteni.

Kaptam, vettem, cseréltem. Ifj. Szlávics László barátom születésnapomra meglepett a mobil-érméim kicsinyített másaival. Ezekben azonban az is fantasztikus, hogy áram nélkül működnek.“ (Jobb oldalon az eredeti mű.)

A sűrűségben a saját alkotásokat mégis gyorsan kiszúrja a szem: a plasztikába beépített finoman kidolgozott fémtárgy vagy tárgyi sorozatok miatt…

vagy, mert várhatóan mindjárt megmozdul. A művek mellé úgy kerül a cím, mint i-re a pont: „Kettősjáték“ vagy a „Csúsztatás mutató gép“.

A műhelyben pedáns rend. „Százezer dolog van itt, mindenről tudom, hova tettem. Nincs az a barkácsáruház, ahol ekkora választék lenne.

Tudtátok, hogy a fényképezőgépbe 6-os csavarral kell az állvány felerősíteni? De boltban ilyen hatost nem kapsz. Van 1 mm-es csavarom is, alig lehet megfogni.

Annyi anyagom van, akár ötven évig is dolgozhatok belőle.

Nagy szerencse ért nemrég. Szemben megvettünk egy házat és ott be tudom mutatni a legújabb műveimet: “Újra kezdés, Megittasulva, Csirkefogó, Izzoláció, Elszabadult luftbarmok…“ Mit is mondtak a Dési Huber képzőművészkörben, amikor megmutatta a festményét: ‚Ez egy halandzsa, a művészetben azt festjük, amit látunk.‘ Ő ezt látja!

19/10/2011 Budapest

Elérhetőség:
www.edeske.hu

“Everybody in my family is a literary person. I grew up on Jókai and Verne books. Everything I red immediately appeared in my imagination. It was a joy. My way was pegged, devouring the books, frequenting a performers’ club. To became an actor? No. Probably because I could not sing. I registered myself to the University of Arts and Crafts primarily I had an interest in book illustrations and posters.

Literature has great effect, as for example, Babits’s poem: ‘The Eternal Corridor’ does.” – He cites at one breath – “The monotonous arches of the endless portico are swimming in the light of hidden sources. What for to look around? No wrinkles on smooth skies, your eyes do not find the ground…. “ (rough translation) And we are already at the architectural geometry, these three-dimensional-looking forms would be impossible to build, but sometimes possible to draw.

It is full of swindle. At the portico, the number of columns above and below differs. It has live trees and dead wood, just to present the time. The perfect picture is preceded by many ones. “They say there are two kinds of artists: one makes a series to gain one successful, the other makes a series of variations based on the single, first successful one.”

The Snail is a formal play, presenting the rule of golden ratio. “A snail, walking on the patio table, served as model. I made some photos to use it one time.”

“The ‘Ship of Fools’ is on publishing in ten volumes here just now, five of them are ready. I am charged with producing 112 copper etchings. In the late 1400s the book of Sebastian Brand was illustrated by Dürer first. The illustrations were woodcuts, that is, the drawings of Dürer, the Master Principal were carved and printed by woodcutter craftsmen (because there were assistant masters as well). There are many forms of reproduction.”

Prints are produced by heliogravure procedure, a form of the intaglio printmaking. Known for 200 years old, along this photo-mechanical process a copper plate is coated with a light-sensitive gelatine tissue which had been exposed to a film positive, and then etched, resulting in a high quality intaglio print that can reproduce the detail and continuous tones of a photograph.

It is important how the paper is absorbing the paint. I prefer the Fabriano and Ingres paper (the latter is finely ribbed). But, if I want a really special, I order handmade ‘screened’ paper from László Vincze at Szentendre.

He puts a cylindrical mirror at the centre. “Mirror anamorphosis is no longer a devil’s trick, even a computer program was written to produce it. Traditionally, a picture is divided to small squares, and then copied into a layer. I made a development in this procedure: only a part of the picture is anamorphosic, giving a secondary meaning. Here is an illustration to the ‘The Raven’ of E. A. Poe. Many people speculate whether it is a fiction, or you hear the poet himself in the verse, as first person singular. While Poe would vehemently protest, I do show him at the mirror.”

Everywhere books. “We have so many, that we can not find what we need. Slowly we have to go to the library, if we want to read one of them.” On the shelf, there are his own works as well. He is ‘Utisz’, the writer (the Greek word means ‘nobody’). And for those being sick of reading, we are smuggling a few lines of him here:

“Opens the book, staring to your face/ It boldly looks into your eyes / It surely knows what you feel / What you think, it is forever.”

Graphics, animation, posters, books… what is more? We were lucky for we have seen the next, but this is a secret until autumn. The only comment: it will be totally new!

11/10/2011 Budakeszi

Elérhetőség és életrajz:

www.utisz-utisz.blogspot.com/

Before leaving, I went to the Zoo to see what needs attention. We travelled by bus from Los Angeles to Mexico City, then hitchhiking around nearly two months there. In my sailor-bag there were my clothes, plus a sleeping bag and the hammock. To sleep on the ground is a danger. On the beach, we rocked between two poles in the night, below us run the crabs, even some scorpions. Being on the way: it is one of the best things in the world. Danger can be everywhere.

I met with scorpions even in Turkey. Under a stone abruptly overthrown, I saw the translucent green body and the rising sting behind. In a second I was on the top of a cliff. In Peru my camera was robbed with its bag, I did not resist for the keeper of a restaurant had a revolver in his open drawer. That time this was the biggest value with me, could not possess for long.

Preparing myself to travel to China, I learnt 700 ideograms in a year. I would surely not able to manage the literary vocabulary of the people’s China, praising the heroic partisan girls and Mao Tse-tung. I did not get to China, but I made agraphic series titled „Tour to West“, based on a Chinese novel. I like the classic Chinese literature.

You cannot reach every place. Reading multiplies the human life, as if it would be a hundred. Read the Fernando Pessoa poem: “Ship, boarding to far away route…” Just the infinity. I like the short stories, especially of Kafka. Originally, my horse was printed in one-color: “Desire to become Indians”. I could not later resist the induction, and I colored it.

Kafka writes about the loneliness, as well as our anguish. My linocut titled “The bird of Kafka” is on this theme.

We hardly have room at home. My stuff is everywhere. There is a pole at the doorpost, for I have had yoga for 40 years. I grew up here. The house was damaged during the war, pieces of the colored window frames and ceramic ornaments remained. In the sixties the plasterworks were cleared, for a while the house was bare, then painted uniformly. Twenty years ago my TV set was discarded, the taste of our son Ákos is not destroyed by computer games. If he has intention, he paints such this one.

This year, I travelled to Norway with my son. This journey for two was the first prize of the photo contest “Europe is Beautiful”. I was in Erdély/Transsylvania together with a friend of folk music. The atmosphere was very good, our hosts began to dance – I thought I could enter that picture to the contest.

I produce mostly linocuts, but I do etchings, woodcuts and drawings. For linocuts, I sometimes upscale my palm-sized drawings. Playing with forms, bizarre things are produced.

The artist is experimenting. The things learned – like the words of a language. The more of them, the bigger the possibility to vary.

For linocuts, I am using floor-covering linoleums. I have a lot of tools, but I mostly use several favorites. Walking on the street, and seeing the small fish-shaped agate pendants hanging in the necks of the women, I feel a desire to tear off its tail fins (not limited to this desire, of course), because the tool made of agate is the best to etching and grinding for mezzotints, while it is used for gilding by restorers as well.

Just like at reading, when I draw, things are appearing before me, I feel their smell and air. I am fond of graphics, if I could, I prefer to do so day and night. Or, I deal with the nature. Cutting up a cabbage, I turn it to draw. I make photos on the dried soil, then I prune my trees. Or, hanging out in the woods, I pick mushrooms; sleep outside in a tent, even in wintertime.

7/10/2011 Budapest

Over time, old furniture are drying up, warping, the wood cracks, legs loose, drawers get stuck. Most of the time they are discarded at house clear-outs. But, wood being cut decades ago means reusable treasures for the expert eyes.“We drove home at clear-out time, collecting usable planks and throw-away drawers, my wife suddenly ordered to stop. There is a bench! Full braking, we jumped out from the car, and we started to pull out the bench from the heap of the discards. It did not move. It was a street furniture bench, screwed to the ground.

” Fifteen years ago one of my mate took me to a restoration workshop. They engaged in renovation and conversion of Empire and Biedermeier furniture. Along three months I polished only, I did not know where I was. Later, I got a work: to dismantle and reconstruct a commode. It succeeded, the German boss’ eye opened wide, then he only assigned the work to me: cut this piece off, put a column there… Ruined furniture was brought here from all over Europe.

I dismantled hundreds of furniture into small pieces. There is no secret to me: joints, plywood thicknesses, and method of gluing tell me everything on the furniture. When I went to another restoration workshop, I was able to make whole transformations, constructing chest of drawers from armchair, cocktail cabinet from writing desk… what the customer wanted.

Renovations are ordered by the antique shops, and the home decorators come with all kind of ideas as well. I get a drawing or a photo, e.g. of an Empire clock case. It is said: from it, make a cocktail cabinet of a man’s height. Or, the round table be expendable, comfortable for twelve people.

The original of this davenport, in Vienna, has a height of 147 cm. I needed to enlarge it proportionally to 170 cm, what is more, its intended purpose was changed. It was two weeks’ work to stick together the pieces according to the blueprint. To invent the dovel joints needed an intensive brainwork.

For the fine joints I use traditional methods only, drawers are made only with grooves. For the fine plywoods I use organic glue only, but I prefer the thick plywood cut by myself, of tropical wood.

The body of any furniture is made of old pine. I bring home any discarded pieces of wood, I get used furniture from friends. After disinfection, I cut them to laths, then the laths are glued together to a given form using my helping hands, the clamps.

It is covered by veneer of fine wood. In the pattern of the apple wood veneer you can see the fine waves, produced by the wind, keeping the branches bending. The lemon wood is velvet-like, glittering a little because of tiny quartz grains coming up from the soil.

Using walnut, you can surface big patterns, even faces and animals are looking back from a cabinet.

To design a hidden treasure drawer is a great pleasure: to find the place of the the small peg opening the secret lock, or of a piece of leather to pull up the hidden drawer. Or what should be the support of a robust and heavy table, that is easy to be lengthened by a tiny housewife (furniture photos by Attila Jámbor)

There are perfect copies, and there are ones to meet today’s claim produced by recomposing a classic style. He even signs these using the wax seal of his father. They are bound up together that the materials used are already perfectly dried up, so you could not be disappointed. We can find peculiar delight in the brillant solutions of the old and proven techniques, not talking about the use of the natural materials. The proof: the dog of the master joiner is licking animal glue.

30/9/2011 Budapest