Bakos Katalin szerk.: Szivárvány Áruház és Nagyvilág, Káldor László (1905–1963) és Gábor Pál (1913–1992) (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2000/4)

"Parallel Lives:" László Káldor and Pál Gábor, two Hungarian graphic designers 1933-1963. Summary

mid-fifties. In these Gábor returned to the course anticipated in the poster-exhibition poster of 1948: there are simple two-dimensional forms, strong colour contrasts, bare symbolic signs. In both posters the "op-art" play of plane and space is characteristic. In the poster for the Budapest Local Crafts Fair (cat.no.: G. I. 28.) Gábor most consistently realized the principle of symbolism. The luminous greenish yellow letter emblem based on the contrast of positive and negative planar forms is unique in his that-time crop and even more unparalleled in the Hungarian design of the times, although there are several analogous West European adverts promoting firms. It was not before 1961 that this initiative found a following in Hungary: then in the work of Gábor Papp. In the lifeworks of the two artists hardly any pieces conceived in the spirit of socialist realism (socreal) can be found. Both avoided the compulsion to make naturalistic, painting-like offset prints to satisfy official expectations loyally: they were active in a field of commercial and cultural posters and used expressive tools that allowed them to do so. Seemingly paradoxically, Káldor came closest to the style that evolved in graphic art after the proclamation of the principle of socialist realism in a poster for foreign trade. The Csepel motorcycle (cat.no.: K. 1.

36, pi. 39.) made for Ferunion, a polychromous offset print, shows the motorcycle leaning against a tree trunk with photographic precision. Yet the poster expected to score success abroad as the photo-like glossy rendering in colour was one of the internationally prevalent formal possibilities.

10 Káldor transferred the idealized workers and the rhetoric of broad gestures into his commercial adverts so that he remained faithful to his linear drawing style. From the latter half of 1955 Hungarian designers were preparing for an important event: an exhibition staged in spring 1956, planning to show designs denouncing the dictates of socialist realism and following the inner needs of the artists' conviction. In addition to the social themes - peace, international women's day, the officially announced theme of the flood - there were several cultural and commertial ads.

11 Designers presented plans, as in 1948, of which many remained unrealized, as no change ensued again upon the artists' initiative. Ernő Mihályti's strongly ideologized review in Művelt Nép reflecting the official political stance indicates that the time had not yet come when the poster had regained its original functions of cultural information and even more pronouncedly commercial advertising, in addition to the political and social themes. What is more, party directives did not only determine the sphere where posters could be used but also interfered with the esthetic solutions.

12 It is, however, typical of the complexity of the situation that evolved by the mid-fifties that several reviews were also written in recognition and support of the designers' endeavours. György Sebestyén even spoke in Magyar Nemzet of the poster's awakening from its "Sleeping Beauty" dream.

13 In Irodalmi Újság, Lajos Kónya declared: "There is not even a trace of the sentimental petty bourgeois kitsch that some people demanded of the genre with a claim to 'socialist realism' not without success."

14 All critics stressed the striking difference between the exhibits and the posters pasted up in the streets, blaming the boorishness and prejudices of the clients for the loss of the valuable designs. All reviewers mentioned one or the other of Gábor's and Káldor's works in appreciative terms. The promise of the exhibition was to come true in the work of the next generation who graduated from the academy around 1950, assisted the great masters in the exhibitions of the fifties and unfolded their autonomous creation around 1959.

15 It was in the year of Káldor's death, 1963, that a series of exhibitions was launched at the Dorottya Street Gallery of the Institute of Cultural Relations presenting the efforts of designers to produce up-to-date, high-quality posters and adverts and to have them socially acknowledged. László Káldor saved his plans exhibited in 1956, which is lucky because most of them remained in plan. The poetical Budapest, the city of healing waters (cat.no.: K, II. 15, pi. 73.) and the strident-decorative Murillo colours (cat.no.: K. II. 5, pi. 71.) show Káldor's most attractive side. The tempera plan ioiSymphonia cigarette (cat.no.: K. II. 27, pi. 72.) shown in the poster exhibition of 1958 also survives. Though it received much lauding criticism, it could only be presented on the back of a card calendar. Káldor walked his path persistently in the second half of the fifties. He made humorous posters with visual gimmicks closely associated with the point of the slogans. He kept designing for Szivárvány Department Store now. as he did earlier for the Fashion Store. His posthumous papers include not only bills for trams, but also plans for advertising postcards, card calendars, and the design for a giant poster on a bulkhead overlooking Kálvin Square,

16 with the logo of Szivárvány Department Store which he had created: the kindly and painstaking moustached shop assistant in a smock. In addition, Káldor planned Lottery, OTP bank account and insurance adverts, as well as sweets, vacuum-cleaner and softdrink ads for collective advertisement. He worked in nearly every area that was accessible to poster design in the years of shortage economy. Hungarian advertisment 1930-1963 1930 is an important date - a peak - in the history of Hungarian graphic design. The Society of Hungarian Book and Poster Designers was founded and debuted at the Museum of Applied Arts. It did not mark the onset but the culmination of a process which ended with the autonomy of Hungarian design with its own professional forums and outstanding artists who were measurable by international standards and many also known abroad via exhibitions and publications.

17 The rapprochement of art and clientele, artists and public relations specialist was promoted by printers, advertisment psychologists, economists in books, special periodicals, apart from the graphic artists themselves. Before World War II, the efflorescence of artistic and professionally high-level poster design was prevented by an ideological, cultural political turn which did not only interfere with the esthetic quality of the output but also crushed the spiritual workshops of ad design. During the war, there was a drastic drop in advertisment. The thirties was the period of Káldor's and Gábor's artistic unfolding, the time of finding their tones in which their stay in France played a great role. After the war, advertising was quickly resuscitated: up to the nationalization, adverts of the old large and small firms appeared advocating "peacetime quality", in addition to posters of political and social mobilization. Later, even some National Enterprises deemed it important to voice that they were producing their goods in the "old" quality for the "people" now. The cigarette and sweets brand names, however, fell victim to the propaganda: "Labourer", "Five-year plan", "Pischinger peacebomb" [a kind of tart]. Next to the Municipal Advertising Company founded in 1911 and nationalized as State Advertising N.C. (National Company) in 1948, there were several smaller agencies for some time. In 1949, however, the newly established Hungarian Advertising Company devoured them all.

18 In 1949, Hungarian Advertising Company launched a representative colour magazine Magyar Reklám [Hungarian Advertisment], which, however, only lived to see three issues. The contents of the