Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. Az István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 16. 1975 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (1978)

Szemle – Rundschau - Fitz Péter: Erzsébet Schaár. The three Marx. p. 375–379.

ELISABETH SCHAAR: THREE MARX PORTRAITS (Three Variations: plaster, plaster-plus-wire. Mesurement: 32 cm. They were executed for the Municipal Council of Békéscsaba in 1974—75. One, cast in bronze, was erected in 1976 in the County Educational Center of Békés.) Elisabeth Schaár finished her Marx portraits early in 1975. These three variations are not merely a series of Studio studies but rather, each of them is a complete work of art and should be considered as such. This is the reason why the portrait executed in bronze is not the most brilliantly formed or most perfect likeness but rather the one which „allegedly" by its very nature requires casting in bronze. Preparing Marx's portrait is an official Sculpture's job. Even if carried out by a real artist, the sculptor is Still seriously impedied by his or hers various former academic or neoacademic formulations. To avoid that, to abandon the conventional protocolar varnish and to establish instead a personal contact which is the precondition of an artist Seeking the human element is the real task of a creative artist. The different formations of the three portraits presents three different facets of the subject's personality. The one in plaster and wire is „revolutionary, prophetic". (Pi. I, 2) The plaster figure on the other hand is „Strict, philosophic" (PI. I, 3) while the other plaster represents the „serene, optimistic" (PI. 1,

1) Marx. Within a portrait, optimately, the Synthesis of the most typical personality features appear in a single work of art. In the case of Marx Such condensation is rather difficult since we have to deal with a personality where a „Synthesis" would easily risk the loss of the „whole" and the Statue would Stiffen into Some memorial Sculpture. (Solution of the problem : in their first exhibition in Luzern the portraits placed in the composition named „Street" could be contemplated together, simultaneously.) To bother about the archetype would be almost meaningless. Still the most personal variation, the portrait in plaster and wire has been inspired by the typewritergraphics of the Swiss artist E. G 1 о о r, which, owing to their artistic form, are primarily void of any sentimentality. Among the three portraits this is the one which most Successfully realizes the human approach of Marx's personality. Stressing the most characteristic attributes of the person — hair and beard — by the use of wire brings the form to life and makes it a bearer of our conception of Marx. The technique of the form's realization render the portrait both breathtakingly alive, almost natural, and in the meantime quite abstract. The suggeStivity of the portrait, with the metallic glow of hair and beard, are at the Same time real and beyond reality. This sculptural technique derives organically from Schaár's earlier works and the organic welding of materials represents the step from the individual into the typical. There is no question of a strained taming of pop elements (wire beard and moustache, painting eyes and eyebrows) as at first sight one is perhaps tempted to believe — this is the adequate formulation of a portrait for Schaár. The perfect unity of form and thought represented here is claimed in vain in the two other, much more conservative portraits. The „strict, philosophic" variation, bearing an expressive material formulation of hair and beard, ressembles in its form, Schaár's work in the early 'sixties. A passionate modelling of the head and the finishing of the eyes and face below the high Smooth brow seem to form a transition to the dynamically formed unity of beard-moustache-hair, all in a single bloc. The „Serene, optimistic" face with its Smooth modelling is derived from Schaár's wide experience with sculptural masks. Uniform Surfaces are formed while modelling the brow, eyes and face giving the effect of Serenity; while the creases, Streaming and jaggedness of the plastic material act as a contrast to the hair's modelling. It is worth while to investigate the mask's role in Schaár's art. It is a curious fact that one of our best portrait sculptors renounced almost entirely the Sculptor's foremost task, that of modelling the human head. It is, however, true that she gained much that way. A mask has the queer quality that in Spite of its individuality it still is much more general than any kind of modelled head. It is both ephemeral and timeless at the same time. The casting itself, with all its disagreable tortures, fixes rare mimic quivers in its brutal formation. It only Seemingly ressembles the cultic death-mask and has but a remote connection with Same, since it contains the living models' reaction, moment and palpitation. As soon as they are placed in the plastic context their personal existence ceases, and they assume a typic rigidity. Their further formation — painting, eyes, hair of wire, tow or plaster — dissolves their rigidity, and they start to live a statue's life. Meanwhile this method had its effect on the portraits too and not merely from the point of view of form. One of the aims of the portraits' modelling became to realize, or at least to approach, the „ephemeral — timelessness" 375