Passuth Krisztina – Szücs György – Gosztonyi Ferenc szerk.: Hungarian Fauves from Paris to Nagybánya 1904–1914 (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2006/1)

FROM PARIS TO NAGYBÁNYA - PÉTER MOLNOS: Budapest: The "Paris of the East" in the Hungarian Wilderness

Georg Lukács, Béla Balázs and Anna Hamvassy. To the left, hanging Károly Lyka in the 1890s György Bölöni, cca. 1906 on the wall: Lajos Tihanyi's painting Forest Road, the early 1910s Photo: MNG Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum, Budapest The magazine A Hét (The Week) was responsible for launching the epoch-making changes in literature and the cultural revival in Budapest. Founded in 1890, the paper was edited by József Kiss, who had excellent relations with the Nagybánya painters. Among the authors of articles on art, mainly critiques about exhibitions, we can find József Nyitray, Ödön Gerő and László Márkus, people with a moderately modern outlook, who seemed to prefer the works of the "classic" generation hallmarked by the names of Rippl-Rónai, Ferenczy and Fényes. Although they opposed the academic spirit of the Palace of Art with a ruthless determination, at the same time they were also critical of Czóbel and his circle, describing them as the Hungarian epigones of Gauguin and Cézanne. Among the magazine's regular authors was Miklós Rózsa, the founder of Művészház, along with Géza Feleky and György Bölöni, the most enthusiastic supporter of Nyolcak.

32 In the majority of the articles, they gave their unequivocal support to modern art. A Hét's most important rival was Új Idők (New Times), a magazine edited by Ferenc Herczeg, which, due to its more pliable conservatism, was also considerably more successful. By and by, Károly Lyka, who was a staff member, began to write his lengthy exhibition reviews from a moderately modernist viewpoint. Owing to his pleasant style, and also because of the paper's large circulation, he became one of the most influential art writers of the period. In addition to occasionally contributing to A Hét, Lajos Fülep published most of his writings in Hazánk (Our Homeland); in a short lived magazine Modern Művészet (Modern Art), whose editor, Béla Lázár had a rather eclectic taste; in the earlier mentioned Magyar Szemle; and in Szerda (Wednesday), a magazine that stayed in existence only for one year. He basically wrote as a supporter of modern art, without concealing his critical opinions rooted in classical traditions. Without a shadow of a doubt, Nyugat (West), founded in 1908, became the most important literary platform for Hungarian progression. Initially, Géza Lengyel, who also sent critical reviews on exhibitions to Pest Napló on a regular basis, authored the majority of writings on art. The list of people who contributed to Nyugat included Artúr Bárdos, who greatly contributed to the renewal of Hungarian theatrical art, and the philosopher Georg Lukács, who on February 1, 1910 published a remarkable study in Nyugat under the title Az utak elváltak (The Roads Have Departed), which future generations came to describe as epochmaking. From our perspective, Bárdos's person is especially important, for he was the man who, in an article about Kernstok in connection with a Nyolcak exhibition held in January 1910, coined the term "Hungarian Fauves", which almost a century later came back into fashion among art historians, admittedly with a slightly different meaning.

33 Throughout the entire period in question, the public could buy the highest quality art magazine Hungary has ever had. In terms of tone and selection principles, Művészet (Art, edited by Károly Lyka, and first published in 1902) maintained higher standards than those characterizing popular tastes in contemporary Hungary; nevertheless, it was able to carry out a balancing act

—almost to the end of the period in question

—between conservative and modern tendencies in such a way that it practically refused to take notice of the most recent movements. With the Nagybánya painters taking centre stage in his own aesthetic judgment, Lyka's tolerance for modernity

—despite his fundamentally liberal principles

—ended somewhere in the neighbourhood of Rippl-Rónai. Revealingly, however, this was enough to prompt the National Hungarian Fine Art Society, the paper's official "master" and primary financial backer, to launch an attack on Művészet in the autumn of 1909, putting forward the rotund but unfortunately entirely unfounded argument that "in the eyes of the patrons of Hungarian art, the introduction of the young giants of Paris straight from the kindergarten was much more important than the presentation of Hungarian artists."

34 The enforced eclecticism of Művészet was a typically Hungarian phenomenon. From this perspective, the appearance in 1908 of an art magazine of very high quality and definite character

—seemingly free of any compromises

—was all the more striking. The Art Nouveau appearance and Post-Impressionist content of A Ház (The House), a magazine published only for four years, reflected the aesthetic principles of KÉVE, an art group led by Ferenc Szablya-Frischauf, but almost every modern movement enjoyed the magazine's support. The editor-in-chief, Béla Málnai, who was among the founders of modern Hungarian architecture, understandably concentrated mainly on ar-