Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 26. (Budapest, 2008)

Zsolt SOMOGYI: An Adaptable Applied Artist. Pál Horti's American Furniture

10. Advertisement of the Shop of the Crafters. Main Public Library Cincinnati and Hampton County. Rare Books Room, no. 749.097717 S

559 1906 Looking back over Horti's career, we can sense the influence of numerous currents of the Secession - Art Nouveau - Jugendstil Arts & Crafts direction in his works, but if he did not develop a completely individual style, this was due to the multifaceted nature of his oeuvre. However, his undoubted talent is shown by his high-standard works, which are acknowledged internationally also. In all his designs he reformulated in an individual manner the impulses that reached him.

30 As the contemporary critic József Diner-Dénes wrote: '[...] there were, fortunately, a few talented Hungarian artists who in none of their works permitted older Hungarian national motifs any kind of influence, who were not mere imitators of different famous West European artists, and who each had his own distinctive individual artistic character. To the group representing these talents I would assign Horti first and foremost. [...] In him we find kinship with certain Belgian and South German artists; here and there he gains an impulse from another artist, but always processes it independently.' We see this approach on his American furniture also: formally it is completely adapted to the local Arts & Crafts pieces. These pieces, however, he made individual, independent and identifiable creations by means of his embellishments. These artefacts can be easily distinguished among the products of the American Arts & Crafts movement, and it is this that will ensure Pál Horti's place in the international and Hungarian applied art of his age.