Horváth János: Balázs János festőművész emlékkiállítása (1904-1927), 2005

JÁNOS BALÁZS (1904-1927) This publication is dedicated to the excellent painter of Kaposvár, whose name has been in recent times recognized however the globe of his paintings is still not revealed to most of the audiences. The „Balázs János Fine Arts Studio" has been wearing his name for more than five decades supporting the art education of numerous rows of generations. The brief evaluation, as „he was brilliant and talented and his early death of tuberculoses was shocking," was spread by the professors of the Studio and more about his art work could be detectable only for those lucky ones who were successful to visit his rarely organised memory exhibitions. At the present exhibition at the Rippl-Rónai Museum devoted to the centenary of his birth more Balázs János paintings would be put on display than ever before. Additionally we aim to give an overview of the curriculum of his life and the main characteristics of his art work. In the artistic atmosphere of the earlyl900s of Kaposvár a reawakening period got started by the fact that the world famous Rippl-Rónai returned to his hometown in 1902 after 13 years of work in Paris. Rippl-Rónai as a member of the „Nabis Group" in Paris formed his artwork according to the most innovative trends of the period. After returning home he soon became an isolated soldier of the modern art and had to face shameful critics and deprived circumstances until the victorious exhibition of 1906 in Budapest. He bought his Villa on Rome-Hill in Kaposvár in 1908 which shortly develop into a meeting place of the artists of the period. Beside the visits of the most famous painters and poets also young painters were frequent guests of Rippl-Rónai until his death in 1928. The celebrated and respected Master became an ideal for several young artists. Rippl-Rónai developed friendly relations with many painters but strictly criticized the unadventurous, conformist trends. Rippl-Rónai has not gather student around himself but was always ready to give advice and orientation and was willing to make corrections of the artworks of entrant painters. The progress of the artistic standpoint and the spiritual development of the young talents of Kaposvár were vastly determined by their ability how to make use of this orientation work of the Master since he was the only possessor of the wide enough horizon needed for the knowledge of modern art. The Balázs family came from Magyaregres, in Somogy County. János's father, who grew up as an orphan and worked as a hired man in agriculture, married Zsófia Göllér on the 7

th of January 1904. Zsófia gave birth to four children, the first one, János arrived on the 22

nd of December 1904. In the pursue of a better living for the large family they moved to Kaposvár in 1914 after selling all their goods. They bought a house with two rooms and a kitchen in the outskirt of the town of that time at number 11 in Arany János Street. They kept animals in the garden of the house and the father undertook carriage work, daily jobs and made agriculture on a shared piece of land. At the outbreak of the fist world war he was called up for military service among the first ones and returned home only in 1918. Despite of all the bad conditions János's parents supported the education of their children at the price of great sacrifices. János's talent in painting and drawing was already discovered in the elementary school in Magyaregres. In the school dedicated to the „Little citizens of the Motherland" the painter Sándor Pazsitzky paid a special attention to the young János Balázs. He was talented and intelligent and as a sixteen years old student he was all set to become a painter and did not really bother about to find alternative ways of living. Since his childhood there was always a special sense of respect of his teachers, friends and acquaintances around him for his extraordinary gift. His strong devotedness took shape in principled behaviour and self-discipline. A special rush of the work of creation infiltrated his behaviour and paintings as if he had suspected that his life would be short. There is a spectacular improvement on his paintings created one after the other. He made no mistakes, never wasted his talent and completely resisted the temptation of cheap quality. He constructed miniature pictures of bible scenes with 57