E. Csorba Csilla: A kamera poétája. Adré Kertész-fotó a Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum gyűjteményeiből (Budapest, 2019)
E. Csorba Csilla: A kamera poétája. André Kertész fotói a Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum gyűjteményeiben / Csilla E. Csorba: The Poet of the Camera Photographs by André Kertész in the Collections of the Petőfi Literary Museum
Movement, jumping and motion represent one of the most important subjects of Kertész’s photographs taken after the First World War. Recent art history research has revealed the close relationship between the photographer, his younger brother Jenő, who often appeared in his photos at the time, and the Freikörperkultur movement, which became fashionable at the beginning of the 20th century. It involved a sporty way of life and the art of movement promoting the liberation of the body.9 The male nudes appearing in their surroundings, their leaping and almost flying motions demonstrate that via his painter friends Kertész was involved in contemporary art trends, whether it was the fine arts, photography or the art of movement. The influence of neoclassical endeavours and mythological compositions of the paintings by his acquaintances Erzsébet Korb, Károly Patkó and Vilmos Aba-Novák who belonged to the Szőnyi school can be seen in his photographs. His portraits made at the beginning of the 1920s also bear testimony to his close relationship with Vilmos Aba-Novák, Gyula Zilzer, Imre Czumpf and Károly Kernstok.10 His sweetheart, later his wife, Erzsébet Salamon (Saly), learnt to draw in Álmos Jaschik’s free school and took dance lessons. Kertész’s experience of dance and the art of movement gained in the 1910s and 1920s can be detected in a number of photographs right up to 1936 when he moved to the United States. His visits to the vicinity of Budapest are represented in several genre pictures and streets in Budafok, Budaörs, Törökbálint, Szigetbecse, Dunaharaszti and Esztergom. Our collections include a single early shot taken in Hungary, part of a Budaörs landscape in 1924. The photograph is recorded in the literature as Wine cellars In Budafok; however, no topographical point of reference has been found and we have also regarded the dating to 1919 as too early.11 The dating of “Budaörs, 1924” presumably in Kertész’s handwriting can be seen on the verso of the contemporary enlargement in the Kassák Museum, so we have accepted it as authoritative. In this photograph, Kertész’s principle of the best opportunity of the moment meets with the composition showing his knowledge of Kassák’s abstraction and geometric ways of seeing, which prefigures cityscapes taken from above in later years and his experimenting zest manifested in his avant-garde photographs. 25
