Barki Gergely et al.: Czóbel. A French Hungarian painter - ArtMill publications 5. (Szentendre, 2014)
Gergely Barki: Czóbel from Paris to Paris 1903-1925
119 В. Sz.: “Czóbel Béla festő kiállítása a Belvederében [Béla Czóbel’s exhibition at the Belvedere]”, Л Nép [The People], 2 February 1924, p 12. 120 I owe thanks to Dr. Robert Holzbauer (Leopold Museum, Vienna) for drawing my attention to the inventory of the confiscated artworks during the so-called Aktion Entartete Kunst (Beschlagnahmeinventar “Entartete Kunst”: http://emuseum.campus.huberlin.de). 121 Molnos, Péter: “Czóbel Béla: Lány kalitkával [Béla Czóbel: Girl with Birdcage], 1922”, in: Winter Auction at Kieselbach Gallery, catalogue, 2012, pp 170-173. 122 Kállai 1934, p 28. Czóbel noted in the interview conducted by Béla Horváth: “In Detroit. In the Ford Museum.” These data, however, require further research. Horváth 1956,1961. 123 Horváth 1956,1961. 124 I would like to express my thanks to Tamás Kieselbach for drawing my attention to the Czóbel works in the museum’s collection. Special thanks go also to Dr. Daniel J. Schreiber, the director of the Buchheim Museum, for his exceptional professional aid by lending the paintings. 125 Later, at the end of the 1950s, he was commissioned to paint a mural that would have been realized in the lobby of the television station on Szabadság [Freedom] (today Széchenyi) Hill. Although the cardboard sketches, utterly unlike Czóbel in style, were ready by the turn of 1957 and 1958, neither the sketches nor the painting of the fresco are mentioned in the scholarly literature on Czóbel. Several short news items regarding the mural’s commission appeared in the contemporary press. According to one article, the deadline for the completion was set for August 1958 (Esti Hírlap [Evening News], 17 April 1952, p 2). Newspapers also published photographs of the painter working on the cardboard sketches (e.g., Ország-Világ [Nation-World], 24 December 1957). 126 Horváth 1961. 127 We know of only one work with unknown whereabouts. It was painted in Germany in 1925 and exhibited under the title La Wilhelmstrasse in 1926 at the anniversary exhibition of the Indépendants. ABBREVIATIONS András-Bernáth Válogatás a nagybányai művészek leveleiből, 7893-7944 [Selected Correspondence of Artists in Nagybánya, 1893-1944]. Edit András and Mária Bernáth (eds). Nagybánya Books, vol. 8. Miskolc: MissionArt Gallery, 1997. BÖLÖNI—ITÓKA Párizstól pocsolyavárosig. Bölöni György és Itóka levélnaplója 7906-7973 [From Paris to Puddleville. The Letter Journal of György Bölöni and Itóka, 1906-1912]. Edited, annotated and introduced by Csaba Nagy. Budapest: Petőfi Literary Museum, 2005. 146. Béla Czóbel: Interior with Woman on Bed, 1922. Bernried, Buchheim Museum der Phantasie. Photo: © Buchheim Museum der Phantasie on Czóbel one more Berlin collector is mentioned, Prof. Fischer, the owner of the Vineyard in Würzburg (Plate 135). Like the other paintings mentioned above, this is missing as well.120 We know that in the cultural politics of Hitler’s Germany, Czóbel’s works fell within the category of the persecuted “Entartete Kunst” (Degenerate Art), but hopefully the works held in professional collections did not perish, were not destroyed and might appear in the future. A masterpiece unknown to the scholarly literature and other sources has appeared in the recent years on offer at auctions. The Girl with Birdcage, dated to 1922, may seem familiar only because of a graphic variant on the subject (Plates 142 and 145). We cannot read about former owner Wilhelm R. Valentiner in the literature, but we know that he was in contact with several Hungarian artists, and he had a prestigious collection in the beginning of the 1920s.121 Though Valentiner had already lived in America in 1921, he often visited his homeland and from there, he gave purchase advice - for example, to the Detroit Museum (later Detroit Institute of Arts), where he eventually became director. From this point of view, it is no surprise that Kállai in his book mentions Czóbel’s having paintings in Detroit.122 Czóbel himself provided information on the whereabouts of his Berlin paintings: “Lots of my paintings were and stayed in Berlin. In Paris, Meudon, I have a female collector. She has several pictures of mine from Berlin.”123 98 CZOBEL, A FRENCH HUNGARIAN PAINTER
