Horváth János: Kunffy Lajos, 1993
CIGÁNYCSALÁD, 1911 Munkacsy's works because it shared with them some similarities. Later Kunffy reflected on it this way: „/ regretted the Munich intermezzo because it jerked me back to a darker, more depressed painting. If I were to have stayed on in Paris at the age of 24, my painting, without a doubt, would have gravitated toward lighter, fresher colors. " In 1897 at the urging of his parents, he returned home for a year and a half to complete his legal studies, and then returned to Paris. He travelled to the seashore where he painted the Secessionist-styie picture called On the Coast of Brittany in 1898. It is a work typical of its time, and beautiful. In recent years it was shown at many international exhibitions. Of the paintings painted in Paris, the Arguing French Priests (1899) brought him much success, as it was exhibited in the new salon. The picture showing a night scene, technically, is similar to works by could do anything our hearts desired. During our work the young men were singing and jesting, of course, тещу the French ones," recalls Kunffy. His first showing in Paris was at the Salon des Artistes France is, with a work entitled The Tea Party. And in that very same year he was exhibited here at home in the Műcsarnok. Also in 1894, in the Salon of the Fields of Mars, Rippl-Ronai succeeded with the most modern artistic styles of the times. Kunffy was not attracted by the decorative linear representations of Art Nouveau. Rather, he began his painting career following in the footsteps of Munkácsy, who then lived in Paris. He was admitted to the master's atelier as well as to his salon. He was impressed by Munkacsy's striking whites that emerged from his dark tones. Kunffy also began to pay court to the salon-accepted fashion of plein-air painting. We quote Kunffy's own words: „With beautiful Parisian impressions and with the success that I experienced in the salon with my first-painting, I travelled home to Hungary in a good mood and with the plan mat during the summer I would paint a real plein-air picture. That is how the Water-Carrying Boy was born at Galdsfa. I drew it thoroughly and the sunshine became expressive on the canvas. I exhibited it, together with the painting exhibited in Paris, at the autumn collection in the old Műcsarnok in Budapest. This was my first exhibition in Budapest" the artist tells us in his memoirs, written when he was eighty. In 1895 Kunffy went to Munich, where he started again to work in a studio. He painted a large canvas on a biblical theme, entitled Job, for the contest called „The Thousand Year Old Hungary. " In this exhibition an extraordinarily large number of artists were represented, and this painting was exhibited in the company of
