The Eighth Tribe, 1981 (8. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1981-02-01 / 2. szám
February, 1981 THE EIGHTH TRIBE Page 15 What’s a transplanted Hungarian artist doing in Nashville, Tennessee? Quite a lot. actually. Sándor Bodó is his name and he's no stranger to the pages of this magazine. Reproductions of three of his paintings graced our cover in 1979: in April, September and November. For good measure, his wife Ilona, a fine artist in her own right, provided our cover in August of that year. The Bodós emigrated to the United States in 1957, after having first moved to Austria, following Sándor’s release from a Hungarian prison. He had been incarcerated in August of 1955 for resisting the pressures of Communism. They first settled in Washington, D.C. but, in January of 1958, relocated to Nashville which has been their home ever since. They have two sons, Sándor, Jr., 27, and László, 22, and have become naturalized citizens. Besides being well-known as a painter, most recently of horse race and hunt scenes, he is also a skillful engraver who gained his earliest recognition in this country for an exhibition at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. consisting of Hungarian banknotes he had designed. More recently, he designed two commemorative medals which have been well-received. One was featured in our April, 1979 issue and commemorated the liberation of Charleston, South Carolina from English siege in the battle led by Hungarian patriot and cavalry officer Col. Commandant Michael Kováts de Fabricy who led his troops and Americans 1,000 miles to reach and defend Charleston on May 11, 1779. This medal was so well liked that it will become Charleston’s official medal. The second, more recent, medal commemorated the 200th birthday of the Bodó’s new home town, Nashville. He has also designed commemorative stamps honoring the Hungarian Freedojp Fighters which were shown at the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, Ohio; 5 postage stamps for the Maldive Islands; a bronze plaque for what is now the Finnish Embassy in Washington, D.C. showing, in relief, portraits of Theodore Roosevelt and Louis Kossuth; and many city and state seals. But his talent doesn’t stop there. He’s made musical instruments and furniture, and he and his wife literally built their Nashville home with their own hands. Hungarians have an extensive and diverse heritage in the arts and the talented Bodós, Sándor and Ilona, are perpetuating and adding to that heritage as members of the Eighth Tribe of Hungarians here in the United States. (SEC)
