E. Csorba Csilla: A kamera poétája. Adré Kertész-fotó a Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum gyűjteményeiből (Budapest, 2019)
Frédéric Rauser: Egy fotográfus Párizsban / Frédéric Rauser: A Photographer in Paris
the city is presented through the artist’s subjective way of seeing. In the same year he illustrated György Bölöni’s magnificent volume The Real Ady with beautiful pictures, which connected the great Hungarian poet with Paris for ever. In 1936 Kertész left France and moved to the United States where he continued his unique, avant-garde work. He died in 1985, but a year before his death he bequeathed his archive, negatives and correspondence to the French state. His oeuvre starting from Hungary through the period spent in Paris to the decades in New York teaches us plenty about the history of photography: about the appearance of the Leica, which he was the first to use professionally, the photograph without an object, the invention of zoom, as well as about the birth of photo re portage as a genre. Life magazine refused Kertész’s photos, giving the reason that “they talk too much”. And indeed Kertész often said: “My English is poor. My French is poor. Photography is my only language.” I would like to thank the Petőfi Literary Museum for giving me the opportunity to say a few words on the occasion of this magnificent exhibition, which bears witness to the universality of the works by an artist I love so much. Opening speech by Frédéric Rauser, Director of the Budapest French Institute, delivered at the opening of the exhibition The Poet of the Camera, Petőfi Literary Museum, 3 July 2019. 17
