Magdalena Abakanowicz

Imre Bak

Maria Bartuszová

Luchezar Boyadijev

Alin Bozbiciu

Geta Brătescu

Mira Brtka

Horia Damian

Radomir Damnjan

László Fehér

Stano Filko

Constantin Flondor

subREAL Group

Tamás Hencze

Károly Hopp-Halász

Klára Hosnedlová

Anna Hulačová

Đorde Ivačković

Olga Jevrić

Zsófia Keresztes

Ilona Keserü

Károly Kismányoki

Eva Kmentová

Stanislav Kolíbal

Július Koller

Genti Korini

Maria Kulikovska

Vlado Martek

Dóra Maurer

Roman Mikhaylov

Vera Molnár

István Nádler

Paul Neagu

Márton Nemes

Dušan Otašević

Roman Owidzki

Mircea Popescu

Gizella Rákóczy

Șerban Savu

Nedko Solakov

Sasho Stoitzov

Kamen Stoyanov

Kálmán Szijártó

Natalia Załuska

chain, fiberglass, glass, metal shelf, mosaic, glue, grout, styrofoam, various dimension 
courtesy of the Artist & Gianni Manhatten photo: Dávid Biró 
 
The body is a reoccurring trope in Keresztes’ practice. Made from glass mosaic, metal chains, Keresztes’ characters are sculptural manifestations of avatars created in digital spaces. She draws parallels between the physical body, limited by gravity, time and space, and the endless, ageless avatars created in the digital realm. She is fascinated by the mirror images of these two (opposing) identities, real and fictional, physical and digital, each existing simultaneously but bound to different forces of nature.

Sphinx

paper, ink, pencil, acrylic on paper, 40 x 29 cm 
 
Martek’s drawings as images/collages and his images as text/collages depict the concept of the artist and how he experiences the world. All of his visual surfaces are an attempt to understand the self and the world: works which document the struggle between the personality, the world and the individual in the south-eastern part of Central Europe.

The Soul

Monotone structure IV

Monotone structure III

Inkjet print mounted on aluminium, 151 × 232 cm 
 
A.H.A. (Art History Archive) is a project based on the experience of Călin Dan and Iosif Király as artists and editors at Romania’s only art magazine during the communist period. Published by the Union of Artists, Arta (plastică) magazine controlled the public image of local art between 1953 and 1989. As a result of institutional changes and the lack of funding, the magazine closed in 1993, also losing the premises where it stored its archive. subREAL rescued the archive, storing it in their own studio. In the autumn of 1994, the Art History Archive (A.H.A.) project came into being, as an application for a residency at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin. As part of the first project in the A.H.A. series, the walls and ceiling of the subREAL studio at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien (a room measuring 10 x 8 x 4.5 m) were entirely covered in photographs from the Arta archive. As the artists also lived in the same space, visitors were able to see two beds and everyday items alongside the photographs. Installation, Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, 1995 / Neuer Berliner Kunstverein, 1996 / Kunsthal Rotterdam, 1996 (part of Manifesta 1) / MNAC Bucharest, 2012* / SALT Istanbul, 2013*

Dataroom (How to Change your Wallpaper Daily)

Map of Europe (Rockets)

Grey and White relief

assemblage, boards, metal and pencil drawing, 63 x 61 cm 
 
In 1963, he began working on plans for the sculptural and bas-relief elements for the façade of the Brazilian Embassy, and these designs became a new launchpad for his subsequent work. His works concentrate on the interactions between the dichotomies of perfection/inadequacy, stability/instability, unequivocal/ambiguous, certain/uncertain. His unique style is a fusion of minimalism and conceptual art, while his two- and three-dimensional works challenge the boundaries between painting, drawing, sculpture and architecture. Throughout his career, he has worked as a teacher, designer, illustrator and architect.

Grey Relief

oil on canvas, 22,5 x 30 cm 
 
Savu’s figures, characterised by loosely applied layers of paint, dark and smoky tones as well as impressionistic forms, portray current Romanian society as it emerges from the rubble left by communism. The sites of his images are most frequently nature (though dominated by concrete), abandoned industrial structures and modernist buildings of rural areas. 
 
Although his focus is on the present, not the past, structures built in the communist era are recurring motifs in his paintings. Meanwhile, the framing, perspective, composition and reality of his subjects are already well removed from socialist realist schematism. At the same time, many aspects of his landscape elements can be connected with the aims of great masters whom Savu always cites, ranging from Brueghel to Millet.

Untitled

Conservation of Energy

oil on canvas, 140 x 170 cm 
 
Sasho Stoitzov is the one and only Bulgarian artist whose name is associated with the notion of soc-art in Bulgaria. In the early 1980’s he came up with a series of large photorealistic portrait compositions which quickly established him as one of the most interesting painters. His compositions combine photorealism and optical effects.

Andrei Program

Blue-and-Black composition

installation, paper, fire, 650 x 400 x 30 cm

The Burn of the Real

oil on canvas, 130 x 130 cm 
 
His Elements in Space oil on canvas painting follows these same principles, made up of tiny spots of colour that completely cover and fill up the area of the image in accordance with the principle of horror vacui.

Elements in Space

Fist City

Human Hand

Human Tongue

wood, cardboard, fabric and plaster, 8,5 x 45,5 x 44 cm

Double Edge

cement, iron, 18 x 9 x 6,5 cm 
photo: FXP Photography 
 
Her earliest works, a series of plans for abstract monuments drafted in the early 1950s, were never implemented in accordance with Jevrić’s original monumental vision. This was primarily because the sculptures— or, as the artist called them, the “compositions in space”—were classified under the heading of “high modernism”. In the words of the artist, Jevrić’s works originate from an “architectural system based on dialectical structural principles”, which represented a great leap forward from body shapes to spatial abstraction.

Vertical Composition

sepia, black and white ink and wash on paper (12 pieces), 19 x 28 cm each

Independence series

acrylic, linocut on wood panel, 131 x 51 x 55 cm

WIP nr 1 (World in Progress)

K-16

laser-cut perspex, acrylic, canvas, wood, 196 x 136 cm

Pour in Pour out 01

laser-cut glass perspex, acrylic, canvas, wood, 196 x 136 cm 
 
The artworks of Márton Nemes are not created only by the traditional instruments of a painter, but foil, wooden chips, and some tools rarely used in painting are also integrated into his creative process. As a result, his pieces are not just traditional paintings hanging on the walls, but they extend into space, blending in with the complementary installation elements around them.

High all the time 01

epoxy resin, 210 x 55 x 40 cm 
 
The central element of Kulikovska’s work is her own body, the idea and reality of which she portrays in a variety of architectural structures, working in natural media (salt, milk and sugar, alone and in combination). Her compositions reflect on the concepts of production, construction and deconstruction and their current expression, but also draws the attention of viewers to issues related to the situation of women in society and to violence against women. The pieces of her Carpe Diem series build upon the tension between joie de vivre and impermanence, drawing from the tradition of vanitas still lives. The series was originally made of soap, which she replaced with epoxy resin.

Carpe diem

polyester, 82,5 x 58 x 10 cm 
on loan from a private collection 
 
Her sculptures—often intended to be tactile objects as well—were inspired from fragile, ephemeral, rounded shapes appearing in nature, such as raindrops, eggs, parts of the human body, dandelion seeds blowing in the wind, waves and air currents. She often photographed her works in a natural environment, and also made several site-specific compositions out of her shell-like shapes. After her divorce in the early 1980s, her sculptural work took on a new direction: instead of the round, organic shapes of her earlier work, she explored forms that were pressed into the surface and bound. Originally made in 1986 and poured again in 2003, the Untitled (Bez Názvu) polyester panel was made using this technique.

charcoal on paper, 100 x 80 cm 
 
“I no longer remember when I received my first paper. I drew kneeling on the floor. The lines escaped from the sheet, running along the floor- boards, losing themselves in the shadow of the furniture. The drawing could be charged with secret power.” MA

“Untitled” from the cycle “Flies”

watercolor and pencil on paper, 14 x 14 cm

Drawing #32 from the cycle of 150 drawings “Crucifixion for the Fisherman”

Drawing #117 from the cycle of 150 drawings “Crucifixion for the Fisherman”

watercolor, pen and ink on paper, 14 x 14 cm

Drawing #124 from the cycle of 150 drawings “Crucifixion for the Fisherman”

iron, 500 x 500 x 200 cm 
courtesy of the Artist 
photo: Miklós Sulyok 
 
His first Iron Drawings were shown at the Venice Biennale in 1990. The group of sculptures was purchased by German collector Peter Ludwig, and the works are currently part of the Ludwig Forum collection in Aachen. In later years, Fehér created several other significant iron drawings, which frequently (as is also the case with Bathers) cite motifs from his earlier paintings and paper works. This work was shown for the first time in 2000 at the Art on Lake group exhibition held at the boating lake of Budapest’s City Park, but later also appeared in the artist’s retrospective exhibitions (in the Hall of Art / Kunsthalle, 2001 and the Ludwig Museum, 2007; both in Budapest).

Bathers

embroidery on canvas, 19,5 x 14 cm (with frame: 56 x 42 cm)

Untitled, form the series Soap

gelatin silver enlargement on paper (10 pieces), 20 x 30 cm each

With the eyes of others

photography on paper (30 pieces), 20 x 15 cm each

Forget it, we can’t afford this

neon, 80 x 80 cm 
 
High Voltage Fence draws on numerous historical references to the Central and Eastern European region, including the iron curtain, as well as confronting the viewer with issues of determining and crossing borders. The blinding light of the surface and the high-voltage buzzing sound generated by the transformers produce an immediate sense of fear and danger. The fence itself however is an exceptionally sensitive and fragile glass piece, and one which seeks, with uncanny precision, to call forth an illusion of originality.

High Voltage Fence

photography, paper (8 pieces), 13 x 18 cm each

Art gesture

Antihappening

Universal Fantastic Questionmark (U.F.O.)

oil on canvas, 200 x 150 cm 
on loan from a private collection

Rhythm in triple

ink on letraset paper, 43 x 61 cm 
 
This work is closely related to Imre Bak’s conceptual book from 1973 entitled Do (It) Yourself, in which, as Dávid Fehér explains, “Imre Bak’s discernments in the psychology of vision lead him to the fundamental question of “existence”: he describes active, “creative” vision as a kind of meditation, while the conceptual figures in his book Do (It) Yourself can be regarded as »teaching aids« for visual exercises that are meant to increase »vision intensity«. The book presents a carefully constructed chain of associations, which summarizes Imre Bak’s conceptual activities. Using basic geometric shapes, it creates a visual representation of a stylized landscape as an archetype, it ascribes concepts to basic motifs [...] Bak’s reduced “landscape-objects” (Sky‒ Field, 1972; Sky‒Field‒River, 1972) broke the archetypal image of the landscape down into its basic elements.”

Landscape With the Four Elements

oil on canvas, 300 x 200 cm 
photo: Gábor Horváth S. 
 
Shapes that are rich in associations with the tombstones returned in her bas-relief textile works in the 1970s, in her graphical reproductions and later in her paintings as well, including Orange-Pink Approach (2000). Throughout her work, “tangled” configurations often appear, emerging from these rounded shapes, expressed at times in a pared-down, minimalist way, and at other times with great passion. Her colours and surfaces are vibrant. Because of the emotional richness, wild and elemental movements of her images, she can also be considered one of the most influential representatives of Hungarian lyrical abstractionism.

Orange-Pink Approach

gouache, pencil and coloured pencil on cardboard, 75 x 105,5 cm 
 
One of his most time-consuming projects was The Hill (1976), a sculpture in front of the Guggenheim Museum in New York, while in 1980, he presented his Project for San Francisco at a show at the Pompidou Centre in Paris. This colossal work was designed to be placed in San Francisco on a site where, as a result of the infinite variations created by the sun, the monumental work would have provided an unlimited view towards the cosmos.

Project for the Port of San Francisco

aquarelle on paper, 24 pieces – 62,5 x 62,5 cm each 
 
The arrangement of the precisely, mathematically defined and overlapping strips of colour all result in a grid-like image structure. The 24 N series, made up of 6 X 4 units, operates on a system created by Rákóczy based on six basic shapes: in accordance with the system, the number and location of the colour fields are always given and finite.

24 N

coloured pencil, graphite and ink on paper, 42 × 29.5 cm

Untitled (Capricio series)

double sided metal relief, 44 x 42 cm , 45 x 41 cm, h 145 cm 
 
Her work was a new point of view of corporeality in Czech art than were previously common. Contact with the body, haptic perception, injury and fragmentation were the most important for Kmentová. The theme of corporeality was the most iconical for her in the 1960s. 
 
The main model of the sculptor’s works were their own flesh and pieces of body of herself and family members. This significant sculpture was represented in many international exhibitions from Berlin to New York.

Hands Mouth & Mouth Fingers

Polyptych

painted canvas mounted on wood, 100 x 160 cm 
 
His main focus was typical consumer objects, making his work comparable to that of various famous American artists such as Roy Lichtenstein (comics), Claes Oldenburg (large-scale replicas), Robert Indiana (sign painting). Inconsolable Serbia (2013), an object shaped like a magnified and geometrized crying eye, is also an important example of Otašević’s form language and use of symbols, both of which can be seen as parallels with pop art.

Inconsolable Serbia

(de)formation C-series I.

Seven Foldings

acrylic on canvas and wood, 25 x 126 cm 
 
In a recent interview with Juliet Bingham in connection with the show of her life’s work at London’s Tate, speaking about the musicality of her latest paintings, and particularly her Bicines, Tricines and Quadricines, she explained: “I call them Bicines, Tricines and Quadricines. They are all related to musical experience. Wooden strips overlapping partly or crossing each other. I painted two or three colours which were contrary to each other, so the dynamic change of the colours happens before your eyes. I would also like to hear them as sounds—harmony or disharmony —to use the work like a score.”

Bicinies 5

My-self (Insumi)

concrete, digital print on sheet, 38 x 28 x 23 cm 
photo: courtesy of hunt kastner

Pansy

oil on canvas, 250 x 198 cm 
 
Alin Bozbiciu is one of the most successful emerging artists from the last wave of the Cluj School of Painting. His works articulate a personal mythology in which reality and imagination merge into magical visual painterly installations. In his elaborate compositions, the artist draws upon references from art history, mythological tropes and theatrical imaginary. His big brush strokes are a tool to convey emotions and sensuality not enunciate content.

Collection Highlights

A–Z