Art in Hungary, 1956-1980
Subtitle: doublespeak and beyond
By: edited by Edit Sasvári, Sándor Hornyik, Hedvig Turai
Contributors: Petőfi Irodalmi Múzeum (Budapest, Hungary); Kassák Múzeum
Publisher: Thames & Hudson Ltd
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 383
ISBN-13: 9780500239780
Copyright date: 2018
Subjects: Hungarian Art
Other titles: Doublespeak and beyond
Description: The international significance of the art produced in Hungary in the 1960s and 1970s has come to the fore in recent years. Nevertheless, studies of modern and contemporary art in Eastern Europe during the Soviet era tend to focus on their relationship to Western art, with an emphasis on the parallel development of similar artistic practices - an approach that risks overlooking the specific circumstances of the art's making. In Hungary's case, artists of the neo-avant-garde found themselves in an increasingly isolated position, caught between the ruling communist authorities, who condemned their art as a product of capitalist cultural imperialism, and a predominantly conservative public, which rejected it as a foreign creation alien to the spirit of national culture. Art in Hungary, 1956-1980 provides a unique insight into the ways in which Hungarian neo-avant-garde artists both responded to and fought against a system that was determined to deny them a sense of autonomy. At the heart of the book is a commitment to understanding Hungarian contemporary art of the 1960s and 1970s - a time of oppressive communist rule in the aftermath of the failed revolution of 1956 - in the context of the conditions in which it was created. Featuring more than 250 illustrations, a bold design and essays on a diverse range of subjects, this book, the outcome of a major international research project, represents the account and analysis of a remarkable period in the history of Hungarian art.
Notes: Published in association with the Petöfi Irodalmi Múzeum and the Kassák Múzeum, Budapest.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Includes translations from the Hungarian.
Table of contents: title: Autonomy and doublespeack: art in Hungary in the 1960s and 1970s  -- Edit Sasvári; title: Under eastern eyes  -- Péter György; title: Hungarian culture +/- Europe: positions and self-images of avant-garde and modernist movements in Hungary, 1915-68  -- Gábor Dobó and Merse Pál Szeredi; title: The art sphere as a grey zone: techniques of power and the context of artistic practices  -- Júlia Perczel; title: Liberty controlled: institutional settings of the east European neo-avant-garde  -- Maja Fowkes and Reuben Fowkes; title: Creative (dis)courses: the forms, methods and locations of alternative art pedagogy in Hungary  -- Flóra Barkóczi; title: Reforming socialist realism: encounters of eastern modernization and western modernism  -- Sándor Hornyik; title: (Dis)figuring reality: new forms of figuration in Hungarian painting, 1957-75  -- Dávid Fehér; title: Abstract boundaries: the changing principles of art policy in 1958-68  -- József Mélyi; title: Domesticated modernism: the role of western émigré artists in the cultural politics of the Kádár era  -- Lóránt Bódi; title: Taboo and trauma: 1956  -- Géza Boros; title: The Holocaust and the arts: paths and crossroads  -- Daniel Véri; title: Out of private public opinion into shared personal opinion: the public, the private and the political  -- Edit András; title: Limited access to greatness: the position of women artists  -- Hedvig Turai; title: Soft-spoken encounters: international exchanges and the Hungarian 'underground'  -- Klara Kemp-Welch; title: Poetry in action: language as a performative medium in the Hungarian neo-avant-garde  -- Emese Kürti; title: Working in the twice-mined semantic minefield: the politics of Hungarian neo-avant-garde movements  -- Magdalena Radomska; title: The influx of images: photo, experimental film and video art in the Hungarian neo-avant-garde -- Katalin Székely.