Imre Györgyi szerk.: A modell, Női akt a 19. századi magyar művészetben (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2004/2)

Tanulmányok / Studies - Bicskei Éva: A helyi mint nemzetközi / The Eocal as International

academy. Nevertheless, due to the rush to adopt European 'classical' art academic training, the School involuntarily introduced an 'innovation' into its curricula. For at least one year, students studied directly after the nude model without first studying full-figure plaster casts; this was in contrast to international practices at the time. Although there are no surviving nude drawings by students after female models from that time, it could nevertheless be supposed that there were also female models. It is well documented that women models posed for head studies from the very beginning, while the first drawing after a female nude dates from 1882. In 1876/7, the School moved to a new building on the capital's prominent Andrássy Street, which had several classrooms for life drawing. The art education of the School was successfully represented in national and international expositions, such as the 1878 world exhibitions in Paris. On that occasion, Székely wrote a booklet about his teaching methodology for life drawing, including plaster casts and living nude models (published in 1877 in Hungarian, and in 1878 in German). Székely was awarded the French Légion d'Honneur for his achievements in teaching. Nevertheless, the rapid development of the School generated several internal growth-related problems. On the one hand, the School lacked atelier, an important part of the international (French) academic education. Significantly, Székely's booklet ended with the complaint that atelier teaching, where a master could deal with promising young artists individually, was not included in the curricula of the institution. Given the international success achieved at the world exhibition in Paris, his wishes were soon accommodated: in 1878, Székely's room in the School was transformed into an atelier with proper lighting, where he could consult with his best students and hold his composition lessons. This meant that another component of the 'classical' art academy was incorporated into the School, paving the way for its later potential transformation from a de facto into a de jure art academy. On the other hand, the enhancement of the level of art education caused problems in the training and qualifying of drawing teachers. In order to be employed in statefinanced schools, drawing teachers in Hungary were required to pass a mandatory examination at the School. Since exam requirements were based on the high level teaching of life drawing, virtually all the existing teachers failed. The School thus effectively monopolised the drawing teaching profession in Hungary, de facto open only to its own graduates, the only ones able to fulfil the new professional requirements. In practice, however, few graduates of the School embraced a drawing teaching career; the majority of them choosing to make use of their high level training to practise art. As a result, Hungarian schools faced an acute lack of drawing teachers. Although there was an obvious need to separate the training of drawing teachers from that of artists, the administrative reorganisation of training took a different direction. In 1882/3, the unified system of art training in the School was incorporated into a three-level system: basic artistic training, assigned to the School; intermediate artistic training, assigned to a new atelier, led by the painter Károly Lötz; and higher artistic training, in another atelier - officially referred to as an 'art academy' - led by the painter Gyula Benczúr. Despite Székely's steady and competent efforts over more than a decade to provide high academic art training, the School was stripped of its higher artistic aims (such as the studies in composition), and assigned to two newly-formed ateliers which provided extended life drawing and training in composition. In 1891, the ateliers were temporarily incorporated into the School, only to be administratively separated yet again in 1897/8. As a result of this radical administrative reorganisation, the teaching of life drawing in the School stagnated. For almost two decades, the only improvement was that - in line with international art academy practice - life drawing was introduced into the curricula at earlier stages at the expense of studies after plaster casts. In 1897/8, the training of artists was finally separated from that of drawing teachers. On the one hand, in order to increase the number of qualified drawing teachers, their training was simplified, following a trend initiated with the simplification of their examination in 1889/90. On the other hand, life drawing in the open was introduced into the training of artists, a feature present in international academic practice. In 1902/3, Székely was appointed art director of the School, and he initiated radical changes in its curricula and in the teaching methodology of life drawing. In order to develop the artistic creativity of the students, mechanical copying (for example, after plaster casts) was totally removed from the training of male students, surviving only in the training of female students. Instead, Székely put new emphasis on artistic training. Life drawing was introduced in the first year of artists' training, and in the second year of drawing teachers' training. Still, living models were judged as being too stiff. As models had to be spontaneous, animals (such as horses) or workers in action were taken to be ideal models, since they were unaware of the fact that they were being studied. Székely also reintroduced training in composition, which had been discontinued in 1883. These changes in the School's curricula and methodology, however, encouraged its graduates to practise art at the expense of teacher activities. Since this resulted in an acute lack of drawing teachers, in 1907/8 art education in Hungary was again reorganised. All training levels were finally unified within the framework School, which was officially transformed into an art academy with different components and specialising in the training of artists and of drawing teachers. This reform ended forty years of institutional instability and reorganisation, opening up new perspectives for academic art training in Hungary. As well as institutional instability, numerous practical problems also had a detrimental effect on the quality of the teaching of life drawing. The School was not able to