Gosztonyi Ferenc szerk.: Munkácsy a nagyvilágban (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2005/1)

I. TANULMÁNYOK - FEJEZETEK A MUNKÁCSY-RECEPCIÓBÓL - KOVÁCS Anna Zsófia: Munkácsy és a francia kritika. A Siralomház és a Milton francia recepciója

színvilágát a 70-es evek első felétől többször érte bírálat. Több változatosságot vártak tőle, így például azt is szóvá tették, hogy gyakran használja fel ugyanazokar az embertípusokat a képein. Az 1875-ös Salonon kiállított Falu hőse című képe első kritikai csalódásává vált. 1876-ban, a sokkal világosabb, könnyed párizsi hangulatot idéző Műteremben című képével űjra maga mellé állította a közönséget és a kritikusokat is, akik úgy érezhették, hogy Munkácsy megfogadta tanácsaikat. 11 Az 1878-as világkiállításon Munkácsy sorsa ismét, egyetlen kép hatására, gyökeresen megváltozott: a Milton sikerének köszönhetően Párizs egyik legünnepeltebb festője lett. (61. kép) 61. kép Munkácsy a Milton kisméretű változatával / Munkácsy with a smaller version of Milton Ez kiváló alkalom volt arra, hogy Munkácsyt a többi magyar művésszel is összehasonlíthassák végre, az összevetés az utóbbiak rovására történt. Bár sokszor szóba került Benczúr, és Paál László, illetve Zichy Mihály műveiről is ejtettek néhány elismerő szót, mindez nem volt a Milton sikeréhez fogható. A francia kritikusok úgy most famous caricaturists of the period, Cham, twice picked on Munkácsy's The Fast Day of a Condemned Man, which in itself can show the popularity of the painting. Through his caricatures, the artist scoffed at the unbelievable success of the composition, rather than trying to expose its (possible) faults. Cham commented the first version of his caricature as follows: "The Condemned — The jury sentenced the condemned to two months of exhibition, throwing m the prospect of winning a medal."

9 (III. 59) The accompanying text for the second caricature went as follows: "We must agree with the idea of death sentence, otherwise this charming picrure would never have been painted.""

1 (III. 60) The two drawings are very similar: in both cases, Cham focused on the condemned's dramatic appearance and the strong contrasts of the picture. After such a successful beginning, many people awaited the continuation. Generally speaking, the paintings Munkácsy exhibited in the next few years all had a positive reception, although none of them could repear the success of 1870. The reason for this could have been manifold. On the one hand, he Failed to hit on a theme as captivating; as The Last Day of a Condemned Man. On the other hand, a new and serious objection to his style of painting had emerged: from the first half of the 1870s onwards, he was often criticised for the dark tonality of his compositions. Also, greater diversity was expected of him: for example, he was often faulted for using the same human types over and over again in his compositions. His first disappointment with the ctitics was related to the painting The Village Hero shown at the Salon of 1875. In 1876 he was able to win back the favour of both the public and the critics with the help of In the Studio, a much brighter composition perfectly in tune with the easy atmosphere of Paris. The critics may have felt that Munkácsy had heeded their advice. 11 At the Paris International Exposition of 1878, Munkácsy's fortune once again changed dramatically, thanks to a single painting. The success of Milton made him one of the most popular painrers of Paris. (III. 61) The expo provided an excellent opportunity for the Paris audience to see how Munkácsy compares with the rest of the Hungarian painters. The verdict was clearly m favour of the former. Although the names of Benczúr and László Paál occasionally came up m critical reviews, and a few words of praise were mentioned in connection with Mihály Zichy's work, too, all this was not comparable to the success of Milton. In the view of the French critics, Munkácsy towered over the rest of the Hungarian field. Aristide Ménandre, for example, was of the opinion that "modern Hungary only had one painter"" and his name was Munkácsy. On top of that, a lot of the French did not see Munkácsy as a Hungarian painter: in the eyes of many, he joined the fold of French painters, causing disappointment to some people by remaining loyal to his