Gellér Katalin - G. Merva Mária - Őriné Nagy Cecília (szerk.): A gödöllői művésztelep 1901-1920 - The artist's colony of Gödöllő (Gödöllő, 2003)
GELLÉR, KATALIN: INNOVATION AND TRADITION
cupboards adorned with lilies echoing the "subtle symbolism" of his painting Lilies. The most mature furniture designer was Ede Thoroczkai Wigand, who united the conclusions of English functionalism and the structure of peasant furniture. He made functional designs in the best vein of the English movement, eliciting the praise of the critic of The Studio already in 1901. He made "story-telling" furniture pieces of folk inspiration and puritan constructivist pieces (work desk of Sándor Nagy), but he was also familiar with designs in the Viennese biedermeier style. The same three sources determined the plank furniture of Mariska Undi that were measurable by the highest standards, as reproductions suggest. Pieces of furniture - chair, stool - inspired by functionality and simplicity are known by Leó Belmonte as well. His small cabinet on the ground floor of the former atelier house was decorated by Sándor Nagy in paint. Ödön Moiret also represented the functionalist design starting from the structure and motifs of peasant architecture in an original way. Around 1910, presumably under the influence of Viennese secession, geometric picture construction became predominant in every genre, carpets, furniture, graphic works. Structuralist composition was decisive in the works of both the older and younger generations, primarily in the output of Rezső Mihály, Carla Undi and Sándor Nagy. PORTRAITS AND LANDSCAPES The portraits, landscapes and garden scenes of the Gödöllő artists - together with the photos of similar subjects - are mirrors of their way of life and professed identity. KörösfőiKriesch's painting and portraits sprouting from the academic tradition were mentioned above. He put some of these traditional paintings in custom-made frames from the late 1890s. Sándor Nagy followed the tradition of dual portraits still in fashion in the early 20 t h century and also favoured by Rippl-Rónai, and used this traditional form, too, to convey new contents concerning their manner of living (Our garden, 1902; Dual portrait, c.1907). Despite its naturalistic rendering, Our garden has a symbolic message; next to the bearded man in sandals there is an owl, next to the woman clad in reformed clothing there is a deer, and the garden is full of lilies. The lily as the symbol of purity, chastity is included in the dual portrait entitled Ave Myriam. Inner spiritual unity is suggested by the Dual portrait of the couple in front of the surface of the garden wall. In a painting of Aladár Körösfői-Kriesch the protagonists are lilies rising in front of the lathe fence (Lilies , 1906). He used this flower to decorate two of his cupboard designs. Another garden scene (1910) has the peculiar extract of the impressionists and an unusual vantage point, while the brushwork is traditional, conventional. Appearing often academically rigid in rendering the symbolical themes, Körösfői-Kriesch created a subtle balance of plein air and Art Nouveau, used subdued soft colours and rendered some details with an impressionistically light hand in his landscapes. The naturalist details are worked out in very thin paint with transparency, although surfaces built from homogeneous, decorative yet soft colour patches are also quite frequent with details added in a fleeting hand (Autumn forest, 1919). His early lithographs of strong thick outlines (Forest , On the road, c.1902) suggest loneliness, anxiety. Sándor Nagy's tempera, oil and etched landscapes are characterised by minutely detailed naturalism, by a subtle elaboration of detail (Early spring, 1910), except for the Garden detail (c.1910) of thickly applied paint patches. His pastels on black and deep green paper (Bathing , The Lake of Szentjakab) mediating a supernatural, mystical experience of nature are the most original. In his graphic works he conjured up the Golden Age and conveyed the principles of a reformed way of life similarly to Fidus (Hugo Höppener). The intimate devotion of the figures, the union with the earthly and celestial worlds (birds, angels) endow the quiet bathing and sun-bathing with an almost mythical glaze. By arranging his paintings in a series, Sándor Nagy made an attempt to create a visual universe incorporating purely cognitive, Buddhist and Gnostic elements. He added comments to his picture like the following: Rabbi (Master), where do you live? - "the first sign of awakening to selfconsciousness"; Our garden - "life envisioned with a garden of lilies", Ave Myriam - "rose replacing the lily", Holy Expectation - "new bud of the rose", Pintyő's world - "getting re-incarnated". 9 6 The sensual female portrait created by the preRaphaelites and living on in Art Nouveau, which turned ordinary women into goddesses, saints or dangerous demons, determined the female portraits of the Gödöllő artists as well. Most of their portrayed women were mothers with children in line with the piety of Madonna pictures. The family and mother with child themes were frequently elaborated by the Gödöllő artists in many genres: paint ings, graphic works, reliefs, carpets and glass paintings. Symbolic ambiguity and the Viennese cult of death and eroticism were quite alien to them. They surrounded the women with the attributes of saints even in everyday situations (rose, lily). Sándor Nagy often painted his wife or other female figures in his allegorical compositions in the company of a deer (e.g. The magic of folk art). By contrast,
