Photography Exhibition The Way They See. An Overview of Hungarian Photography

Curator: Gabriella Csizek

Hungarian photography occupies a distinctive place in the world history of the genre as its 20th-century chapter cannot be written neglecting the Hungarian influence. It is not merely that there were a number of prominent and talented Hungarian artists active in this period; it was that the Hungarians determined and shaped the development of visual perception. An overview of the nation’s photography at the beginning of the 21^st century, therefore, is both a challenge and an obligation. On the one hand, the assessment of the Hungarian aesthetic challenges comprehensiveness: is it possible to provide a broad yet sharp analysis to a foreign audience? Does an attempt at an all-encompassing coverage benefit the understanding of Hungarian photography at all? Where should the balance lie when the world-renowned examples alone can speak of our treasured accomplishments in the genre? Such and similar questions provoke the obligation itself: reflecting on a rich past today provides the opportunity to represent the birth, the development, and the continued life of the Hungarian talent.

Our exhibition of over 350 images by over 100 artists, along with additional projected series, texts, and, not least, the catalog published jointly with essays by photo historians and expert authors, provides one kind of journey by drawing the personal stories of determining individuals and by thus learning about the influences that refined them and through which they affected their descendants.

http://maimano.hu/en/kiallitasok/way-see-overview-hungarian-photography/

http://www.mnw.art.pl/en/temporary-exhibitions/the-way-they-see-an-overview-of-hungarian-photography,29.html