Balázs Eszter: Art in action. Lajos Kassák's Avant-Garde Journals from A Tett to Dokumentum, 1915-1927 - The avant-garde and its journals 3. (Budapest, 2017)

György Tverdota: 2x2 - The Journal Edited by Lajos Kassák and Andor Németh (1922)

György Tverd óta

2*2 - THE JOURNAL EDITED BY LAJOS KASSÁK AND ANDOR NÉMETH (1922)

Despite appearing for only one issue in October 1922, the journal 2x2 wrote itself into the history of ‘isms’. That is because it carried one of the most significant works of Lajos Kassák and thus of the Hungarian avant-garde, the poem A ló meghal és a madarak kiröpülnek [The Horse Dies the Birds Fly Away], which one of the editors, Andor Németh, later described as “Kassák’s best writing"., [Fig. 1] The tension between the apparent insignificance and actual importance of the journal inevitably arouses curiosity. A striking feature is the structural symmetry, as suggested by the title. The number two may be a reference to the two editors, who shared the space equally: Kassák and Németh. Both had complete control over their respective halves. Kassák stated in the introduction: “the journal is edited by two people in one framework, but completely independent of each other”.1 2 The “twice” that precedes the “two” refers to the editors’ dual capacities. They were also authors, and published their own works in the journal. This interpretation, however, comes up against a hidden asymmetry, a “material fault”. Kassák actually appears in three rather than two capacities. Inserted into the text of The Horse Dies the Birds Fly Away are two of Kassák’s abstract compositions. Kassák’s introduction to his own section also conferred on him the role of essayist, effecting another asymmetry. Within the symmetrical structure of 2x2, then, Kassák had a hidden but definite dominance.3

AVANT-GARDE AND CULTURAL TRANSMISSION

Kassák, in addition to being the all-powerful editor of MA [Today] was involved in producing other journals during his time in Vienna in the 1920s. In his determination to break his isolation from readers in Hungary, whom no publication bearing his name could reach, he put out individual issues of his journal under different names - Kortárs [Contemporary] and 365- and attributed them to different “editors”, such as Aladár Tamás. With 2x2, however, he

1 Andor Németh, Emlékiratok, Részletek [Memoirs, Extracts] in Idem, A szélén behajtva, Válogatott írások [Driven along the edge, Selected writing], Magvető, Budapest, 1973, 611. Lajos Kassák's poem is translated into English by Edwin Morgan at http://digiphil.hu/o:kassak_ alo.en.tei [consulted 21 December 2017],

2 Lajos Kassák, [2*2], 2*2,1/1., 1922, 33.

3 “Kassák did the typography for the journal, and so it had a very appealing design.” Andor Németh, Emlékiratok, op. cit., 610.

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