Kostyál László: „Hirdette utcákon tereken” Németh János művei köztereken és középületekben (Zalaegerszeg, 2004)

„Professed in the streets and squares ...”

In 1983 Németh also moulded the Transport relief, which is on display in Kaposvár. Working in a way that was unusual for his world of plastic arts, he was given a task requiring him to represent means of transport. This work was not centred around man or the landscape, but around the artificial world created by the former. The coach, the engine, the ship, the milk float and the aeroplane appear in a simplified yet authentic depiction, which resembles a child's drawing. The direction of their movement is always parallel to the plane of the frieze, limiting the area of the composition to a relatively narrow stripe blocked by the basic plane at the back. There are also toys in the relief crowded together yet still independent of one another in order to fill the available surface as completely (and masterfully in its realisation) as possible, as if shoved into a drawer, symbolising the variegation of modern passenger and commodity transportation. As a result of the artificial nature of this subject matter, the mettle typical of the master's other works is missing. The frieze of the Kígyó Pharmacy in Zalaegerszeg, made in 1986, presents emblematic figures of healing from both ancient and Christian traditions. In the centre the tree of life functions as the axis of symmetry; its roots feed on the waving water of life and the tree supports a shining sun-disk. Next to its trunk, with hands touching and faces looking at us, stand the figures of Hygiea and Esculap borrowed from Greek mythology. Hygiea is carrying a plate of magic plants in her hand, while a snake is twining itself round Esculap'

s stick, which is a symbol for pharmacies. At both sides of the piece figures of two physician saints of the Eastern Church, Cosma and Damian appear holding a flask and a gallipot respectively. The former is wearing a Hungarian-like flower-decorated cap; the latter a broadbrimmed hat. In spite of the harmonic composition, there appears to be a great gap between the figures of the two cultures, as if an entire world stood between them. Despite Németh'

s simplification, the two mythological figures bring to mind classical Greek art, while the strict profile of Cosma and Damian as well as the monumentality of their figures refer to the depiction schémas of the Assyrian-Persian cultures. This very difference is to exemplify the universal character of healing and pharmacies spanning over ages and civilisations, with the tree of life in the centre supporting the sun as a pillar, under the foliage of which the ill of all ages may find salve and begin to recuperate. The tree of life symbol, which plays a central role in Németh'

s art, reaches its zenith in a relief sculpted in 1994 for Kinizsi Pál Secondary School in Zalaegerszeg. The two largest branches of the giant tree of life are holding the moon and the stars on the one hand and the vitalising sun on the other. At the top of the relief a phoenix is nesting, the symbol of the eternal renewal of life, and the roots of the tree are being washed by the river teeming with all types of aquatics, such as fish and shellfish, surrounded by exuberantly scented flowers and a riping field of wheat, at the root of which one of the searching birds of the skies can find its daily food. Life - the artist professes - is eternal. Let glorious days and dark nights, summer heat and thrilling winter that makes us shiver come; let grains of wheat fall into the soil and bring new crops; let any water flow down the river; let the phoenix perish any time, for it will still be reborn: Vita brevis. The tree of life is an ancient pagan symbol preserved in folk art, but the whole allegory can still be interpreted from a Christian perspective as well: "As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease", God said to Noah after the flood (I. Moses 8,22). Life is a central concept of our earthly world, the innermost essence of our existence - it is common to plants, animals and man, the medium of both religion and secularism, the root cause of every utterance we make. Despite the various interpretations of its meaning, life is to date the biggest unsolved mystery of all, and the most precious treasure of anything living. This treasure manifests itself in the artist's pictorial confessions. 16