FERENCZY, Károly

This painting, painted in Munich in 1894 but later modified, is generally considered as a symbolic self-portrait, closely connected with the self-portrait of 1893, also painted in Munich.

After 1906, Ferenczy painted more and more pictures in a studio. He appears to be no longer attracted by the Nagyb�nya landscape, he seems to have exhausted this subject matter. Summers in Nagyb�nya wake his interest and his previous source of inspiration provide him with subject matters suitable for painting in studio.

Mountains, forests, shining skies and the bright sunshine appeared again in his canvasses in the summer of 1911 but his aim was no longer to express unity of man and nature by subject matter and surroundings united in atmosphere. “Archers” demonstrates that the unity of man and nature has new qualities in his pictures. It is rather like a summary which makes motifs decorative patches. The picture does not focus on the girl and boy, but on an object and three colours: it is the score-card in white, black and red. Delicately tinted colours lend a dynamic character. Motifs are drifted into one area of space in spite of distance. He produces tension with the noisy colours of the score card, and the delicate colours of landscape and figures. “Archer” is the best example of uniting Ferenczy’s early and late periods.

While painters of the Nagyb�nya school were first attracted to painting alfresco by the beautiful mountains, K�roly Ferenczy had started doing so during his Munich stay. “Birdsong” is Ferenczy’s first step to leave Basten-Lepage’s “delicate naturalism” for his own style. The picture is free from details. The random appearance of impressionism in details of nature and capturing atmospheres, lights and colours hastily painted could not be more unusual for him.

Like other works of Ferenczy, “Birdsong” is carefully considered as a composition. The picture is limited to the woman embracing the trunk. The forest is symbolized by white trunks of birch-trees, bending leaves and harmonies of green. The picture is filled by a woman in red clothes. The red colour of her clothes and the delicate greens of her surroundings contribute to the lyric portrayal of the ralationship between man and nature. Forms are outlined in a definite way in the soft light glimmering through leaves. The woman is gracefully embracing the trunk of the birch tree. Leaves are not visible over her face which she turning upwards, yet one can still sense the forest over us and smell its cold breath.

Until Ferenczy arrived at the final version, he had done two drawings and a sketch in oil.

Boys Throwing Stones, painted in 1890, was one of the major works born during the time that K�roly Ferenczy spent in the town of Szentendre. By that time Ferenczy had already been to Paris, and after having settled in the small town near the River Danube, he tried synthesize the experiences he gained in the French capital with his own way of perceiving nature.

The figures of the boys are monumentally set against the melancholy, barren landscape. Their movements are well observed, the rendering is far removed from any kind of narrative character. Although the gestures show different phases of motion, Ferenczy emphasizes the eternal character of the figures. With not a single bright colour patch to be found, the various shades of pearly grays dominate the finely wrought, dull colours. Ferenczy later joined the artists’ colony at Nagyb�nya, where he developed a new style of painting.

Since Ferenczy had been appointed a teacher, he started to paint more and more studio genres, e.g. still lives, nudes and portraits, and before very long, his interest turned to portraits. “Double Portrait” is a good example which demonstrates his decorative skills. Ferenczy enjoyed painting portraits of groups, some of his works from his late period were portraits of two or three people. His portraits were not just elaborate character portrayals, but compositions: he realized his ideas on composition. “Double Portrait” shows his 18-year-old twins, No�mi and B�ni. The picture is rich in authentic details of character. He painted the clothes of his children, No�mi’s dress with lace and B�ni’s grey pullover, with delicate care. No�mi’s white dress is a warm patch in front of the blue background. Greys and blacks of B�ni’s clothes might fade the picture, but the white and red folk art cushion restores balance. The composition is based on silhouette: a blue curtain closes space behind the figures, thus their silhouettes become more definite.

Three finished versions and two oil sketches are known of the Evening. Furthermore, there are two drawing studies showing only two figures. The painting depicts three naked young men standing on the bank of a stream with their back to the viewer.

“An Evening in March” portrays landscape in a realistic fashion. Yet Ferenczy’s picture contains more than meets the eye: it is not only orthodox churches and white stone-walls, but the peaceful atmosphere of a town in sunshine, nature preparing for spring, the fragrence of cool air and the azure of the sky in Nagyb�nya: a late afternoon in May. It is surprisingly new what takes place in this picture: this is the very moment when sunshine appears in Ferenczy’s painting, it is not sunshine glimmering through leaves but warm brightness flooding the picture. The twilight makes everything, stone-walls, trees, people and animals more colourful. There are long dark shadows stretching only along the earth in the foreground and the silhouettes of carriages are sharply projected on the white stone-wall as if figures of a shadow theatre. Ferenczy again composed a picture: the long stone-wall and the Fekete-hill behind it make up a long horizontal strip which runs along the picture-plane in the middle of it. The old birch tree on the left and the vertical form of the church tower make them a solid composition.

This composition consists of light and shadow besides forms and lines. The boundary of the horizontal line in the middle is drawn by light and shadow. The dark, shadowy foreground finds its counterpoint in colour and form in the bright sky. The monotony of the stone-wall is broken by carriages and their shadows. The counterpoint of the church and the church tower can be found in branches of pussy willows with the bright azure of the sky glimmering through.

It is largely due to the strong contrasts of light and shadow that it was lithographed (in fact, it was the only lithograph that was made on the basis of Ferenczy’s works), although he simplified the composition for this purpose, made the contrast of dark and light stronger and light and shadow were contrasted in more homogeneous surfaces.

“Gardeners” was painted during Ferenczy’s Szentendre period. Composition, lighting, colours and details follow naturalism. It is typical of him in composition that space becomes limited. The figures of the old gardener and the boy standing next to him have characteristic contours in front of a homogeneously light background. Their group can be easily identified even from a larger distance. The arrangement of figures and the balance between light and dark colours prove Ferenczy’s sense of decoration which played an important role all through his career as a painter. He characterizes forms with a delicate contrast of light and shadow. Ferenczy had prepared two composition studies prior to the picture with models appearing in other oil pictures (“Gardener” and”Gardener Watering Plants”). “Gardeners” is considered to be a major picture of Ferenczy’s first art period. What is appreciated here, is the skills of an artist at the beginning of his career, his knowledge, his firmness of finding his own wayand his efforts and steadiness to carry out his artistic plans.

In 1889 Ferenczy returned to his family at Szentendre after a three years study tour in Paris. This lyrical painting was executed in Szentendre and it is one of the two paintings which were exhibited publicly at the 1889 Winter Salon of the M�csarnok, the first exhibition of his works.

In his Szentendre period Ferenczy’s paintings had simple subjects. Among these paintings there were several genre-type, most of them destroyed later by the artist. The present canvas is one of the few surviving paintings.

According to the Bible, the older brothers who were jealous of their father’s love sell Joseph to the Ishmailites (Book IV of the Old Testament). The picture shows the most tragic scene of the betrayal. Joseph, stripped to the waist, is seized and led to the merchants in white burnous who have just arrived. Ferenczy’s picture, which is the largest of all in size, opens prospects: in the background of the scene there is a huge plain area with figures lining up in the foreground. It is not necessary to know the biblical story to understand what is going on. The foreground is divided according to colours and forms (dark skinned people and figures wearing white mantles) which find their counterpoints in peaceful blue and brown patches of the background. The background and the sunset making colours brighter unite the composition with Joseph and a man in a luxurious mantle in the middle who rises to the same level of importance as Joseph is because of the golden mantle complementing the blue of the sky and the river.

The picture was painted from beginning to end in the open air, as it is known from Val�r’s letter to his father, the size of the picture must have presented a lot of technical problems. The model who posed for Joseph was Val�r.

In Ferenczy’s “Woman Painter”, it is apparent how limited the portrayal of nature is around figures. Instead of monumental forests and mountains, he depicts details of home. The setting of “October” is the garden of the family’s home in Nagyb�nya. The open sunshade and the garden furniture reflect homeliness and cheerfulness. Details selected at a random indicate peacefulness of the country. The most important element of the picture, a diagonal, is almost unnoticed and it runs from the top left hand corner to the bottom right hand corner. Diagonals normally result a dynamic effect. In this case, however, it only organizes the picture because its effect is diminished by horizontals in the background. The line where the fence, the mountain ridge and the sky meet makes up the diagonal from the highest point of the sunshade, then crosses the hat of the man reading a newspaper, his back and the table cloth. This diagonal is a borderline at the same time. To the left of it, objects of everyday use are depicted, and to the right the autumn landscape in the glimmering sunhine. Gentle sunshine brightens the colours and is especially reflected by white surfaces. Apples on the table display a bright shade of red from among whites, yellows and autumn colours.

In addition to producing brilliantly coloured plein-air paintings of subjects basking in sunshine, at Nagyb�nya Ferenczy also worked inside his studio, producing works of more restrained colouration. This particular work made in 1904, was the first in the series of nude paintings, which took up most of his attention in his last creative period.

The theme of Ferenczy’s “snapshot”, which was actually carefully composed, was a painter instructing his model how to pose: with palette in his hand, the artist directs the nude model how to sit on the armrest of a chair. The colours are restrained and the picture has a homogeneous grayish-brown tone, in which only lighter masses of the two figures stand out. The painting’s unity is primarily based on the rhythm of the lines. The shaped line starting at the head of the painter runs along the arms and returns to the head of the model, encircles it and finally runs down along the curving line of the body. In addition to this curving line, the impersonal face of the female figure is also emphasized by the lavishly decorated picture frame glittering in the background.

When Istv�n Genthon was writing a study on K�roly Ferenczy’s portraits, he considered all his portraits (81 out of 351 pictures) which constitute a significant part of his oevre as far as quality is concerned, although he is not counted as a portrait painter. Ferenczy, a master of biblical compositions and bright landscapes, attempted to realize artistic objectives in portraits, too. He often raised the individual to the level of the general, yet his objectivity and realism opposing reconsideration always produced genuine character portrayals.

Ferenczy’s “Self Portrait” painted in Munich ranks high among his portraits and other pictures. Ferenczy refers to the relationship between man and nature in an intimate way. His portrait is not the portrait of a painter in the usual sense. The artist is not painted in front of a work which he has been working on in his studio or in the middle of props typical of his profession. Ferenczy’s face, open, young and serious, flashes up in the foreground of dark leaves of a forest. His clothes and face vaguely reflect the light glimmering through branches. The painter in a dark jacket is not posing for the portrait. The brush gently follows the face and soft lines of the hair.

The first summer in Nagyb�nya resulted a large size composition of a biblical nature. The gloomy and splendid landscape inspired the painter to pass on a serious message. The three major elements of the composition are a group of people in the foreground, light green leaves of the trees in the forest and monumental mountain chain the background. Critics concluded from the dominance of nature that in the case of this picture nature dominates man who is subordinated to it, although Ferenczy does not consider him insignificant. He emphasizes the group of people by applying various tools: they are placed in the foreground, formal connections are justified by content and are the lightest strip as far as colour is concerned. Ferenczy was reported to have been preparing for this biblical topic very seriously. His family, friends and models accompanied him to the mountain he had selected and they posed for his picture. The final version was predecessed by a lot of studies and sketches, as well as an oil sketch for the whole composition which was ready by 1896.

The subject matter and the composition, however, still engaged him so he painted “Sermon on the Hill” in a second version where the figure of the man appearing in nature became even more accentuated. His figures were more condensed and became oversize. At the exhibition in 1903, the second version was presented which Ferenczy thought of as his final approach to the theme. The picture from 1897, however, survived in fragments. For reasons still unclear, its owner cut it into pieces. Unfortunately, the middle part was lost, only its right and left sides have survived.

The laid table with armchairs around it in the garden of the Ferenczy family often appeared in Ferenczy’s pictures (“Sunny Evening”, 1904, “Sunny Morning”, 1905, and “The Prodigal Son”, 1908). “Sunny Morning”, like “October”, showed an idyllic scene in a little town. Ferenczy views the bright and peaceful subject not as a humorous one, his considerations as artist make his pictures more than mere genre pictures. The morning sunshine penetrates under the branches of the walnut tree. Eyes are drawn to the table with white table cloth. Shadows of objects (a fruit basket, apples and a blue carafe) are projected on it, together with the delicate shadow of the basket chair which is not in the picture. The natural posture of people sitting around the table is a part of the arrangement. The edge of the table running diagonally is accentuated by the arm and trunk of the female figure who is leaning back in the armchair and by the borderline between light and shadow on the leaves.

Ferenczy’s composition at this time was characterized by Istv�n R�ti as follows: “… he places his figures into narrow space and full figures. It is carefully decided on the basis of proportions and patches how much of them should be portrayed. Proportion of space is shifted towards figures, what does not diminish the importance of atmospheres in the pictures …”. The contrast of surfaces in light and shadow is definite. The way he painted the warm colours of faces which are in the shadow of hats is simply superb, just like the grey silk dress. Ferenczy’s style of painting is more dynamic and delicate coloured at the same, mow that he gave up his previous plain style.

There are four known versions of the painting depicting figures in front of a red wall. The one and two-figure versions are variations oo theme of reading in the open air. The chronology of the four versions is not known.

“An Evening in March” opened Ferenczy’s “bright” period: instead of visions full of emotions, he painted pictures inspired by reality. The subject matter of “Paintress” was taken from reality. Pupils of the Nagyb�nya school appeared with canvasses and easels in various parts of the town. They were accepted by people living in Nagyb�nya, and who were even too pleased to pose for pictures or to help young artists. The model of “Woman Painter” was Ilon, a woman miner in Nagyb�nya, who is portrayed in other pictures of Ferenczy, too. The composition is built on the rhythm of shadows of tree trunks and sunny strips. The thick tree trunk steps into this diagonal system with great daring and the figure of the paintress appears behind it. She is standing in the middle of dazzling greens on the hill-side. Colours of the picture are identical with those on the palette. The subject matter is painted with bright simplicity, everything appears so natural that the spectator will think after first viewing it that the painter’s only ambition was to paint what he saw. After careful study of the picture, the spectator will of course notice how beautiful the picture is.

The portrait represents the painter’s three children, his son Val�r (1885-1954), painter and graphic artist, and the twins B�ni (1890-1967), painter and graphic artist and No�mi (1890-1957), a painter who established tapestry in Hungary.