Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 26. (Budapest, 2008)

Ildikó PANDUR: Variations on a Sculpture. Questions and Answers Concerning the 'Ironworker' Sculpture Formerly in the Jungfer Collection

ILDIKÓ PANDÚR VARIATIONS ON A SCULPTURE QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS CONCERNING THE 'IRONWORKER' SCULPTURE FORMERLY IN THE JUNGFER COLLECTION Gyula Jungfer (1841-1908) was the bestknown member of a dynasty of artist-smiths that stretched back five generations to the 18

,h century. The centenary of his death which falls this year provides a good occasion to recall in connection with his atelier a sculpture made using a special technique and possessed of an interesting fate. As a result of their distinctive physical properties, metals and metal alloys require different methods of working. Casting and beating are the two basic techniques with whose help sculptures can be made. In the case of casting, the metal most frequently employed is bronze (an alloy of copper and tin) and its variants of differing compositions;

1 rarer in this procedure is the use of brass (an alloy of copper and zinc), aluminium bronze (an alloy of copper and aluminium, a metal which has been known since the mid-19

,h century), or nickel silver (an alloy of copper, zinc and nickel known since the 1820s). When beaten work is required, copper alone can be used. As a basic material, iron is very rare in this genre. Small-sized sculpted embellishments were made from iron by 'carving' the metal when cold, especially at the time of the Renaissance. (In Gyula Jungfer's oeuvre, too, we find examples of these among ironwork details on sculptures for buildings; for instance, the dragon figure on the latticed main gate of the Hungarian Parliament building was made in this way.) Counting as a curiosity are the two lion's heads which Jungfer beat out from iron for inclusion in a group of artefacts displayed by the Zólyom Iron Works at the Millennial Exhibition of 1896.

2 A monumental sculpture made from iron is rarer still. Using a technique he himself developed, Fritz Hausmann in Germany made a gigantic sculptural group' that was exhibited at the Paris World Exposition of 1900. Executed by the Armbruster brothers, it was considered by contemporaries to be more of a characteristic exhibition piece and example of professional bravura than a work of art.

4 'In the field of monumental sculpture, iron - which was more difficult to work, more prone to corrosion and at the same time lustreless - could not compete with bronze, which was yellowish brown, shiny when new and easier to cast.'

5 Of the different metals, the most popular and widespread material for sculptures in public spaces is bronze, which develops a patina and which is best able to resist changes in the weather. It is easy to cast, and in most cases this method of replication is easier than beating out by hand. For example, as we learn from an account relating to the works submitted by iron artists for the Millennial Exhibition of 1896, 'in most of the artefacts intended for outdoor use, crude smith's work predominated; [...] on most of those meant for indoor use we saw embellishments beaten out from sheet-metal'." Large outdoor copper sculptures were made in minute number. Some of them were one-off memorials;

7 the majority can