Tóth Vilmos: Funeral Art - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2006)
Funeral Art in the Second Half of the 20th Century
he used in the 1930s differ from those characterising his later periods. The angel figure over the Dvorzsák grave is among the finest sacral works made in the period (F 7/8). However, Kerényi's most significant funeral piece was made at a later date: completed by 1961 and set up as a sepulchral monument in 1966 (K 34/2), his statue of Csontváry is better known in its replicas exhibited in Szentendre and Pécs. There are several funeral works attempting to render the moment of creative inspiration itself above the grave of the artist they mark, but few bear comparison with Kerényi’s sculpture, which uses the commemorated painter’s famous self-portrait as its starting point. Another piece by Kerényi deserving mention is his revelatory Christ figure, originally made in 1972 and then set up on the artist’s own tomb (F 25). Unveiled in 1937, the funeral monument of Csinszka (F 7/4) and the Deér family's sepulchre (K 42), which can be dated approximately to 1938, are among Tibor Vilt's early masterpieces. These and Vilt’s similarly expressive, figurái works, such as the Rihmer (F 7/10), and the Szécsi (K 35) tombs as well as the eliminated Nyiri sepulchre, find an interesting counterpoint in his funeral pieces of a non-figurative style erected decades later. Standing out of the latter type is the statue over Károly Varga's grave (F 8/2) and, most importantly, Lajos Kassák’s funeral monument unveiled in 1977, which is a three-dimensional variation on a piece of pictorial architecture by the painter (F 21/1). Based on a similar conception is Vilt's most important funeral work, which he designed in collaboration with Gyula Gulyás, the sepulchral monument of Lili Ország (F 19/3) employing the painter's characteristic symbolism on a squat, sarcophagus-like architecture. On the piece sculpted in the form of a statuette by Vilt around 1979 the places of Lili Ország’s motifs still appear as blank surfaces. Funereal Art in the Second Half of the 20th Century The oeuvres of Pátzay, Kerényi and Vilt provide a transition to a more recent period in the history of Hungarian funereal art. By that time Farkasrét Cemetery had become the foremost burial facility of Budapest, which is why most of the genre's major representatives can be found there. The main reason for that is the closure of Kerepesi út Cemetery (1952) and the subsequent relocation or clearance of many of its funeral monuments. Since the re-interment of Prime Minister Batthyány’s mortal remains, the burial ground of Pest has come to be closely related to the reigning political regime of the day, which meant the appropriation of the cemetery and the strictest possible control 57
