Vargyas Gábor: Istenek, ősök és sámánok (Szentendre, Szabadtéri Néprajzi Múzeum, 2012)

ZOLTÁN NAGY FOR THE OPENING OF GÁBOR VARGYAS' EXHIBITION We seldom experience such a peculiar situation in life: by an amazing twist of fate I may express my thoughts at the occasion of Gábor Vargyas' exhibition. The particularity of this is that fact that almost 20 years ago Gábor Vargyas was my teacher, and we slowly outgrew the teacher-student relationship and even the master-pupil relationship and we have become colleagues and sincere friends. Furthermore - and not to forget - he opened the first of my exhibitions too. I have learned my profession from Gábor Vargyas. All what this exhibition shows to the public. I did not learn only cultural anthropology but even its definitive way of working: the so called long-term participating field-work. This is today a classical working method, however applied only by few in Hungary before Gábor Vargyas: to live together for months and years with a far-away people, adapting himself to their culture for the purpose of observing their life, learning an unwritten down conversations and experiences and acquiring such thorough knowledge about the given society so that finally we are able to describe the people authentically and to interpret their lives for ourselves and for our readers. Gábor Vargyas represents the typical classical field-worker whose expectation and norm is not less than field research carried out in the appropriate way; he experiences the yearning for adventures, inherent in all of us; and he is an official and professional traveller besides being a man of science. He has always been pursuing this aim, steadily and unwavering. Since his schooldays he wanted to become an anthropologist and he did everything to achieve his goal: he read the relevant literature, from the diaries of explorers to serious reference books. He used to work as voluntary assistant in the Museum of Ethnography museum and he has learned the languages considered as useful. Whenever he had the opportunity - and opportunities were often provided - he went on a journey for satisfying his inquisitive mind. He crossed over hanging bridges, hunted tigers, he carried on his head his recorder packed in a plastic bag when crossing rivers and when hungry for vitamins, he ate citric acid producing ants. In compliance with the myth of classical field-work, he is engaged, blinded by his zeal and a bit mad. Only a mad person is able to carry home in the airplane shaman swords and huge containers of rice-beer instead of other useful and more profitable items for the family - as the customs officers once explained to him. But would he be only a bit less obsessed, now we could not admire his shamanic altar set up at the end of the exhibition, which - composed from insignificant elements -, however remains monumental in his fragility. But we should not mix up the anthropologist's work with the work of the explorer and adventurer. His journeys are no pleasure trips but permanent effort and work. Here I don't refer to the fight against the elements and the physical endurance also not to the torturing solitude, however necessary as working tool, also not to the lack of understanding there and at home but to the busiest moments during field-work, knowing that otherwise time often hangs heavy. When during a performed ritual the anthropologist has to follow up simultaneously the sacrifice of the buffalo and the events inside the house; when he should take pictures, record the sound and take notes at the same time without the least possible disturbance of the performers. When he should help the host and carry out his own work at the same time, while the notepad is always in his pocket. And it is not always the most difficult task how to select between the events or to meet our expectations even with the help of the local people but it is the most difficult: not to miss the most important moments, to be always alert and open for the events of life. This exhibition allows us to see a lot from this subject. The microphone is visible on the photos because the words cannot be missed for a more artistic picture. We see the fellow-traveller, the researcher's assistant and supervisor writing in his notepad. Still, not everything is shown on these pictures, with the exception of the photo on the poster. The researcher is not on the picture; the anthropologist thought that his person is unimportant, only the result of the research is important. His photos suggest only his permanent presence. His sympathies and antipathies, his tiredness or good mood may only be guessed. Although he remains outside of the photos, his personality shines through: Gábor Vargyas is a real teacher. A person who likes telling and knows how to tell things to others, which they don't know. He presents. He explains. He helps in interpreting. He goes into details; he is methodical and precise and uncovers correlations. It is not possible to interpret this exhibition otherwise than considering it a scientific study. Only, it is not written in sentences as generally, not expressed by motion picture, as a documentary film but it consists of a series of pictures. His pictures don't exist by themselves - although they could - they compose series. Like in a picture book he shows that segment of the Bru's life, which he is most interested in: their religion. After some introductory 8