Balázs Eszter: Art in action. Lajos Kassák's Avant-Garde Journals from A Tett to Dokumentum, 1915-1927 - The avant-garde and its journals 3. (Budapest, 2017)
Márton Pacsika: Purposeful Player of the New Instrument - Lajos Kassák and the Budapest MA
They were thus universally interpreted as political attacks on Lukács and the Communists in general. Within a few days, the Revolutionary Governing Council discussed the incident, and a consensus was reached that Lukács, who was a member of the Council, must be defended against the criticisms. Béla Kun’s government issued a communiqué37 and Ferenc Göndör, together with his journal Az Ember [The Man], was banned from publication for a few weeks.38 39 Interestingly, Kassák’s name did not arise at the meeting, and MA was only mentioned in the Press Directorate, where People’s Commissioner Béla Vágó, citing a Russian example, defended the artistic direction of the avant-garde journal. Lukács later responded to the criticism,40 rejecting what he saw as aspirations to hegemony by Kassák’s circle as well as pressure from the Social Democrats. Ideological, political and artistic conflicts among the various [22. MA, “Demonstrative issue from May 1919”, 1919, [front cover with Sándor Bortnyik’s iinocut], Budapest [23 ] Lajos Kassák, Levél Kun Bélának a művészet nevében [Letter to Béla Kun in the Name of Art], MA, Budapest, 1919, [front cover] 37 György Lukács and the executive of the Hungarian Socialist Party, Nyilatkozatok [Declarations], Népszava, 18 April 1919, 7. 38 Magda Imre-László Szűcs (eds.), A Forradalmi Kormányzótanács jegyzőkönyvei, 1919 [Minutes of the Revolutionary Governing Council, 1919], Akadémiai, Budapest, 1986,312-317. 39 Minutes of the 15 April 1919 meeting of Committee 9 of the Press Directorate, in György Lukács, Forradalomban, Cikkek, tanulmányok 1918-1919 [In revolution, Articles and essays 1918- 1919], Magvető, Budapest, 1989, 429-430. 40 György Lukács, Felvilágosításul [For clarification], Vörös Újság, 18 April 1919, 4. 86
