Magyar Hírek, 1984 (37. évfolyam, 2-26. szám)
1984-10-13 / 21. szám
CHRONICLE The balance of the external economy has improved in the past three years. The Central Statistical Office published a comprehensive account of the major economic processes of 1981—83, which established, that Hungary's external economic balance has improved in contrast with the deficits recorded in the previous ten years, export surpluses of 6,800 million forint and 17,600 million forints were recorded in 1982 and 1983 respectively. The target of external economic stabilization could only be reached by curbing domestic consumption, and necessitated the cutting back of imports, and an increase of exports. Investments have been reduced by 11 per cent since I960 in order to improve the balance of trade, and are now identical with the 1976 level. National income shaped according to plan. About two-thirds was provided by industry and agriculture, although last year, due to adverse weather conditions, the value of the latter was slightly below the average of earlier years. Production of stateowned industry showed a modest growth, but that of cooperative industry fell back by 5.2 per cent. Smallscale ventures, private and enterprise work teams recorded production values of a total of 4,500 million forint in 1983. On the employment front the number of active earners has been gradually declining since 1976. The labour force stood at 4,936,000 on 1st January 1984, 35,000 less than a year ago. At the same time public utilities have been extended. A further 380,000 homes have been connected to water mains in the past three years, a total of 2.3 million families now enjoy the benefits of water available at the turn of a tap. A further 75 villages have been connected to gas mains network in three years, raising the number of towns and villages thus supplied io 227. Nicholas Schaffer at Kalocsa. A series of lectures were given at Kalo« sa with the participation of the Hungarian artist Nicholas Schöffer, who now lives in Paris. About fifty artists and adult educationists from the whole of the country attended the four-days event. The subject of the lectures was: opportunities for the application of technology in art and education. Nicholas Schöffer presented musical works he composed with computers in a concert held in the Kalocsa cathedral. Anthology of Hungarian literature in Esperanto. Corvina Publishers of Budapest issued an anthology in Esperanto, that presents a selection of Hungarian literary works from the earliest times to our days. The anthology is based on the translations of the eminent Hungarian Esperantist, Kálmán Kalocsay (1891— 1976), who had already published an anthology in Esperanto in 1933. That work was now supplemented with the works of contemporary Hungarian poetry and prose, most of which were translated by Vilmos Benczik, who also wrote the introduction. The Hungara Antologio provides not only a historical panorama of Hungarian poetry, but also endeavours to give an image of the whole Hungarian literature, prose and drama to Esperantists of five continents. It is a useful source for literary historians giving as it does a bibliography of books translated to Esperanto from Hungarian. Conference on the 20th century history of Hungarian Jewry. A twoday conference was held in Budapest with the title “Hungarian Jewry in the 20th Century”, It was organized by the Institute of History of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. The conference was attended also by Israeli historians invited to probe into the problems of Jewry and of antisemitism, and into the circumstances of the 1944 holocaust of Hungarian Jews. The conference was opened by György Ránki. Péter Hanák lectured on assimilation at the time of Austro—Hungarian Monarchy. Károly Vörös outlined the sociography of Budapest Jewry in the second half of the 19th century, then Ferenc Mucsi read a paper on “The Jewish Question at the Time of the Great War”. Professor Nathaniel Katzburg, of the Bar Ilan university at Ramat- Gan lectured on the relation of antisemitism and antisemitic legislation, while Don Yehuda, also of the Bar Ilan university discussed its economic effects. László Varga read a paper on “Anti-Semitism and the Blind-Alley of Assimilation between the two World Wars”, followed by Miklós Laczó on: “Hungarian Jewish Writers and the Jewish Question between the two World Wars". Austro—Hungarian co-operation in rheumatics research. The National Rheumatics and Physiotherapy Institute of Budapest, and the Ludwig Boltzmann Rheumatological and Balneological Institute of Vienna have been conducting joint research into the causes and therapies of rheumatic ailments. Recently the Austrian and Hungarian scientists exchanged experiences in Budapest, and came to the conclusion that metabolic, immunological, and genetic processes also play a part in rheumatic illnesses, not only viral infections as was believed before. Scientists of the two institutes agreed to continue their joint research into clearing up the aetiology and pathology of the primary, chronic arthritis within the frame-work of the Austro—Hungarian Cultural and Scientific Agreement. In memóriám Brassai. The legendary photographer. Brassai. who died at his home on the Cote d’Azur, was one of the outstanding members of the great Hungarian school of photographing which included André Kertész as well as Robert Capa. Brassai’s original name was Gyula Halász. His nom de camera is derived from Brassó (Transylvania) where he was born. He was first a painter and rose to the stature of the greatest as a photographer, as a spiritual companion and portraitist of the greatest artists of the age, from Matisse to the surrealists. He was a close friend of Picasso and like him spent most of his life in France. The Orosz family There are three name-plates on the door: István Orosz, Dóra Keresztes, Marci Orosz. The split-level apartment on the outskirts of Budakeszi is crammed with posters, drawings, paints, children’s toys, fair-tale books, a drawing board, and even a photolaboratory. Dóra Keresztes made the illustrations of the books. According to her own admission, she had been preparing for this profession since the age of 11, and was interested primarily in cartoon films. Having completed a special secondary chool for fine arts, she graduated at the typography department of the College of Arts and Crafts under the guidance of János Kass and György Haiman. She feels most at home in the presentation of jolly folk themes. She designed the first ‘peasant decameron’ in 1977, still as school girl encouraged by Liviusz Gyulai. She has been exhibiting since 1978, and won prizes, the last at the Tihany Biennale of Small Graphics. Illustrations of her latest books for children and adults are in the press, and most recently she has also been using textile and peasant embroidery techniques besides coloured lino cuts. She well merited winning the main prize at the ’82— 83 Beautiful Book competition. She also made a cartoon film to the poems of Sándor Weöres, the “Moon Film”. István Orosz met Dóra Keresztes at the College. After graduation, he obtained a post at the Pannónia Cartoon Films Studios, Budapest, and made his film, “Silence”, which won a prize at the Zagreb festival of animated cartoons. Trompe Voeuil, tricking the eye. characterizes his drawings. He also uses graphic tricks in cartoon films, illustrations, and posters. As a member of a Hungarian—French co-production group, he spent three months in France. At present he is working on a 30 minuteiq document-legend, Ah America, based on Ferenc Dániel’s script. The film, commissioned by Hungarian Television deals with the Hungarian immigration in the early part of this century. The bearer of the name shown on the third name-table Marci, was born in 1979. Being of tender age, he may be one of the live actors in the cartoon film the Keresztes-Orosz partnership wants to make in Italy about the animation of nursery songs. Á6NES SZÉCHY 30
