Hann Ferenc: Paulovics. Kántor Lajos és Kocsis István írásaival (A PMMI kiadványai. Pest Megyei Múzeumok Igazgatósága – Ferenczy Múzeum, Szentendre, 2008)
Kocsis István - The painter, his altarpiece and his Stations of the Cross (Excerpts)
The secret of Paulovics is the same as that of the many thousand inhabitants of the Szatmár region. The natives of Szatmárnémeti escaped from the threats surrounding them into the sheltering ancient traditions of the town. Running from the constantly growing danger, they escaped into the impregnable fortress of ancient mysteries. (...) If my friend László Paulovics were here with me in this church, we would start an animated discussion on the Szatmár theatre, 'just for a change'. We would praise the faith, self-esteem and courage of the actors who brought back the Szatmár theatre into the Golden Age of Theatre; we would express our appreciation for their conduct and their art, since, for us, they are the winners who overcame terrifying, dramatic situations in the most terrifying times. We would agree upon the reason why we talk about the Golden Age of the Szatmár theatre, when even the stage designer was a great artist; anc the reason is that we cannot acquiesce in the fact that the theatres of Budapest today are less significant and ambitious than the Szatmár theatre was during the really unbearable 1970s. .. I wonder if the secret of the Szatmárnémeti theatre was really that the artists in Szatmár escaped into the Hungarian traditions, the mysteries of bygone centuries, as into impregnable fortresses, from the growing danger. By respecting the animating, holy traditions, did they really bring the Szatmárnémeti theatre back to the nineteenth-century Golden Age of Hungarian theatre, when catharsis was an everyday event on Hungarian stages? If we gave an answer to these questions, we would perhaps answer the most painful ones of our times: why did Hungarian theatrical art fall into decay? I can only guess why, in present-day Hungary, there are not real theatres worthy of the ancient traditions of Hungarian theatrical art. We can only guess. Maybe the present-day theatres do not undertake what the Szatmárnémeti Theatre did under much harder circumstances: the Hungarian theatrical art today does not build an impregnable fortress based on the miraculous stones of the ancient Hungarian traditions and mysteries. The animating holy traditions of olden times are not respected, nay, they are derided. Today's theatres stage a strange, pitiable play whose protagonist, the tragic hero who suffers devastating misfortunes, is the Hungarian theatrical art itself. 'We shouldn't, we must not acquiesce in this/this is what Paulovics would say if he were here. A famous stage designer at the Szatmár theatre, he frequently asks how the decay of Hungarian theatrical art should be stopped. I am looking at one of the pictures of the composition. My friend, László Paulovics walks into the church through a wall and sits down next to me. We start to speak; but this time we do not speak about the most important questions of theatrical art. We are talking about the vital questions of the Hungarians... We discuss whether the Hungarian people have a future. We discuss the future of Christianity... whether European Christianity has a future... (...)
