Öriné Nagy Cecília (szerk.): A gödöllői szőnyeg 100 éve - Tanulmányok a 20. századi magyar textilművészet történetéhez (Gödöllő, 2009)

Summaries

Summaries 129 her life to the art of goblin when she started to study it in Paris in 1912. Four years later, in the exhibition of the Ferenczy family organized by the Ernst Museum, she presented six carpets she designed and weaved with her own hand. Her exhibition début gave proof of the release of enormous creative energies. What she learned from her master in Paris was the technique

, but her really decisive experiences were spiritual. She discovered, all alone, genres, masters and eras for herself. The result of the unconscious selection evinces a determined character, an early-evolved artistic taste and a mature point of view. All the time, the equilibrium is held between material and the spiritual purport of her works, a harmony created with an infallible professional control. Between 1920 and 1932 Noémi Ferenczy was living in Transylvania - in Nagybánya or in Brassó. In the meantime, she spent a longer time in Vienna in 1924, and in the winter ol 1928 and 1929, she lived for several months in Berlin, actively participating in the artistic life in both cities. Two of her early works entitled Nővérek ('sisters') and Harangvirágok ('blueballs') soon went abroad into private property. Both point with emphasis to the ideal and visual possibilities of the vegetal and human existences mutually referring to each other. The human and the vegetal universe depend on each other, have common fate and are equal parts of the great totality of nature. The birth of the carpet Asó ember ('digging man') two years later indicates that a definite change took place in her approach. Ihis work of art is doubtless a caesura on Noémi Ferenczy's creative path both in intellectual regard and in the mode of its formulation. Henceforth, most of Noémi Ferenczy's carpets are work symbols. In the decade of 1920, her numerous one-man exhibitions open abroad and she is invited to several international salons. Ihe critiques enthusiastically acclaim the high level intertwining in her creations of creative work and the manual skill of craftsmanship. Ihe success of the exhibitions in 1

929 gave Noémi Ferenczy a great impetus for definitely settling from Rumania to Hungary. The period of her artistic fulfilment ensued in Budapest in the 1930 s. Petra Török "...cut-out from the infinite carpet of magic" - The textile, embroidery works and forgotten manufactures of Anna Lesznai By relying on primary sources: Lesznai's diaries and correspondences, and by scrutinizing the textile artworks of the oeuvre, the study summarized herein surveys the factors and properties that, in spite of their distantness manifesting in space and in their social circumstances, are identical or similar in the endeavours of the artists of Gödöllő and those of Anna Lesznai. Folk art and the ornamental treasury of forms thereof have basically determined Lesznai's artistic and creator identity. Ihe topos of the "provincial, rural, close-to-earth ", i.e. of the natural way of life is unquestionable in the formation of the ornamental, folk-art-rooted attitude of Lesznai being a landowner; all the accessories of the rural life became the main source of inspiration of her works. The collection of folk art motifs, the presentations of form- creating principles and the drawing of conclusions in cultural history are present in Lesznai's endeavours, but the requirement of satisfying any declared principles or ideologies whatsoever is missing. Ihis ambition arises from the modern aestheticism of art nouveau, which was characterised by a purely aesthetic, ahistoric and ornamental content. Her creative period that began from the 1910s is represented by floral and vegetal ornamental embroidery and by designs, sketches painted with tempera and watercolour. As prefigurations of her designs, the analysts mention the patterns and the treasury of motifs called Matyó from Mezőkövesd. Indeed, Lesznai did deeply immerse in the study of this universe of forms and stitch technique; nevertheless, her designs were strongly intellectualised. Their characteristic feature is the refined and delicate combination of colours, which is dissimilar from peasant embroidery. Ihe flowers, flower stems, the plants unfolding from a chalice, vase or more rarely from a horn of plenty often invoke an association with the world-tree Lesznai used in this period as the simile of her world view. She often complemented these designs with animal ornaments, especially with stylised forms of birds. Lesznai engaged in a growing exhibition activity with her embroidery and designs from 1912. In addition to her appearances in Hungary, she exhibited in 1912 in Paris, Vienna, then in Berlin, where the department store Wertheim bought her entire collection for further production. Lesznai's letters dated in this period confirm the supposition that the "Lesznay manufactory" enjoyed, including also the commercial aspect, its outstandingly prosperous period with a lot of orders received and accomplished within and without the frontier. Lesznai propagated, during the manufacturing activity of her workshop, the idea of respecting handicraft traditions, the effect and strength beyond all comparison of hand-made articles, similarly to her companions ol Gödöllő.