In 1907, along with painting at Ciacova, Smigelschi donated funds to the families of those killed during the peasants' revolt. The following year, Smigelschi won a competition for the Vilmos Fraknói prize, guaranteeing him 3,000 crowns annually, a studio and a residence in Fraknói's Rome house. In September, he also organized an exhibit at the Budapest Kunsthalle—side by side with Ignác Roskovics' works, and drawing favorable mentions from Hungarian critics (including Miklós Rózsa of "A Hét" newspaper). In 1909, Smigelschi painted the Greek-Catholic church in Rădești. During this time, he began to show symptoms of heart disease that grew progressively worse. He received an order for painting the altar in a Rákóczi chapel in Hungary, which remained unfilled, while painting for the Blaj cathedral and the remainder of the Sibiu cathedral was left in the planning stages.