A Selection from the Collection of the Central Bank of Hungary
In 2024, Márton Nemes represents Hungary at the 60th Venice Biennale International Art Exhibition. The contemporary art collection of the Central Bank of Hungary includes many of the artist’s works. Our exhibition complements the solo presentation in the Hungarian Pavilion by placing Nemes’s works in a broader art-historical context. While the Techno Zen project deals with the expansion of painting and the creation of a 21st-century Gesamtkunstwerk, the exhibition Movement – Gesture – Sign showcases the predecessors of Nemes’s artistic practice and the approaches of some of his contemporaries, whose work is based on a similar set of propositions.
A significant aspect of the selection was highlighting the transgenerational influences, similarities and differences. One segment of the exhibition presents the Neo-Avantgarde trends in painting after the Second World War in Hungary. We picked works from artists Tamás Hencze and Ilona Keserü that directly influenced Márton Nemes’s artistic development. While Hencze was the first to explore the painterly possibilities of the “frozen gesture” and the blur effect —also playing a crucial role in Nemes’s work— Ilona Keserü explored the intersection of the colouristic gesture, the motif and the sign. All three artists can be characterised as advocates of the seminal importance of “tekhné”, i.e. the painterly deployment of the lessons of applied arts, as well as the presentation of painting’s industrial character.
István Nádler’s calligraphic gestures meet Nemes’s attempts to interpret the work as a meditative object, a possible path to spirituality. János Szirtes’s composition is made up of 25 individual non-serial pieces. The work, which appears abstract, mixes the image of a real phenomenon in the visual world with the painterly qualities of gestural abstraction.
Nemes’s work combines sensuality with conceptuality, which is evident in the displayed pieces. The paintings, created mostly between 2017 and 2019, already reflect one of the key ideas of the Techno Zen exhibition; pushing the boundaries of painting and the medium’s expansion to create a work that engages all senses. The work loses its two-dimensional, visual integrity and opens up to all spatial dimensions. The aim is not merely to deconstruct the aesthetic and harmonious surfaces and the notion of classical easel painting but to extend the “immersive” aspect of the medium, complementing its traditional tools with the latest industrial design processes (laser cutting, automotive paint, reflective materials). Thus, modern technology contributes to the semantic layering of works not just in terms of form but also in terms of content.
In varying ways, Nemes’s contemporaries reflect on the same phenomena that continue to transform the visual language of our current era. Their paintings are connected —not only in terms of form but also in terms of content— to Nemes’s work, uniquely reflecting the changes in our perception.
The minimalism of Áron Baráth’s paintings draws a sensuous veil over the canvas surface, while the weightless, transparent layers unite the bright surfaces of digital screens with the ephemeral quality of his painterly gestures. The brush stroke is also a fundamental element in Dávid Szentgróti’s practice. In his paintings, the paint mark transforms into a sequenced entity, constructing an illusory composition from layers of superimposed and dislocated transparencies and occlusions. In the biomorphic formations of Orsolya Lia Vető’s paintings, the visual world of computer graphics blends with the playful possibility of the human gesture and the utilisation of an industrial colour palette. Andrea Tivadar’s paintings reflect her vision of virtual spaces, neon lights and digital graphics.
Exhibited artists:
Áron Baráth, Tamás Hencze, Ilona Keserü, István Nádler, Márton Nemes, Dávid Szentgróti, János Szirtes, Andrea Tivadar, Orsolya Lia Vető
Curator: János Schneller, Art historian
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