partnereink
FAJÓ, János
FAJÓ, János
Biographical Notes
1937: Born in Orosháza, Hungary
1950–56: Joins the Békéscsaba Fine Arts Society while still at high school, his sole interests being drawing and painting.
1956-61: Graduates in decorative painting with honours from the Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts in Budapest.
1961–65: Studies aesthetics, art theory and philosophy and organises exhibitions at the Young Artists' Club.
1964–67: Studies under Lajos Kassák, being his only pupil.
1969: Travels across Western Europe with Kassák's widow, meeting Carl Laszlo in Basel, Victor Vasarely in Paris and Max Bill at the constructivist biennale in Nuremberg.
1971: Participates in the International Graphical Symposium in Soest, Germany, where he learns the technique of serigraphy.
1974: Establishment of the Pesti Műhely (Pest Workshop) and its publishing branch the following year.
1976: Becomes for the next 12 years the director of the Józsefváros Gallery, the first non-profit workshop-gallery in Hungary. During this period the gallery develops into an international forum, its profile ranging from experimental art to design.
1976: Embarks on an annual programme of leading summer schools, which forms an integral part of his work at the Pesti Műhely and the Józsefváros Gallery.
1976–80: Spends a month each year at the Rába Works.
1979: Awarded a prize at a wood sculpture exhibition in Cegléd.
1982: Takes over the management of the Pesti Műhely. In the years following 1984 he privately publishes portfolios of Kassák, Vasarely, Max Bill, Nicolas Schöffer, Gerstner, Pfahler and Linschinger, and turns his professional relationships into friendships.
1985: Awarded the Munkácsy Prize.
1989: Starts teaching at the Academy of Applied Arts.
1992: Marks the beginning of the period when his sculptural art reaches maturity. His small marble, metal, wood, bronze and plexiglass sculptures become known. Using cutting-edge technology, he starts making large-scale metal sculptures first at the German Binder company and later in Hungary.
1995: Executes a commission for Bácsborsod, the home village of László Moholy-Nagy, for a centenary memorial to the artist.
2000: Participates in the exhibition "With Art into the New Millennium" held on the Városliget pond. His entry is acquired by the Karsai Ltd in Székesfehérvár.
2002: His "Circle in Three Dimensions" is erected at the entrance of the Hotel Novotel in Budapest.
2003: Exhibits 15 of his large-scale plane sculpture art in the Millenáris Park in Budapest. Selected solo exhibitions 1968 • Fényes Adolf Gallery, Budapest
1969 • Fészek Club, Budapest
1971 • Galerie Minimax, Basel
1973 • Esztergom, Hungary
1975 • KKI Dorottya Gallery, Budapest
1980 • The Kossuth Lajos University Hall, Debrecen, Hungary
1985 • Centro Documentazione Artein, Rome
1988 • Galerie Eremitage, Berlin; Ost-West Galerie (with Max Bill), Zurich
1990 • Retrospective Exhibition, Műcsarnok, Budapest
1991 • Haus Ungarn, Berlin
1992 • Graf und Schelbe Galerie, Basel
1994 • Bilderhaus Bornemann, Lübeck
1995 • „New Sculpture”, Körmendy Gallery, Budapest; Galerie Haslinger, Vienna; Galerie von Bartha, Basel (Harasztÿ, Hencze)
1998 • Schöffer Museum, Kalocsa, Hungary
1999 • Erdész-Menshikoff Gallery, "Art Fair", Stockholm
2001 • Cultural Centre, Bucharest
2002 • Kulturinstitut Ungarn, Stuttgart
2003 • A.P.A. Gallery (with Imre Bak and Andy Warhol), Budapest; Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Wörlen, Passau; Millenáris Park, Budapest; Dürer Terem, Gyula, Hungary
************************************************************* I was trained as a painter. Form an early age, however, I have been attracted to three-dimensional forms such as balls and cylinders, which might explain why I became a sculptor-painter.
The sight of solid forms still fills me with enormous pleasure. As mental stimulants, beautiful, proportionate and shapely objects are my particular favourites, providing me with an irresistible urge to make sculptures. When this feeling engulfs me, it fills me with so many "plastic" ideas for sculptures that I am barely able to realise them.
I learnt the trade from masters, none of whom was a "remit artist". My first teacher, József Mokos in Békéscsaba, was a polymath and a comprehensive educator. The others who followed: Hincz, Kassák, Vasarely and Max Bill were also all universal artists, whose creativity was not bound by genres and categories, producing, as they did, door handles, kitchen stools, graphics, sculptures, paintings and whole buildings. Totality, optical entirety, was their remit.
Consequently, it has always come to me naturally to produce anything I fancied and had to the opportunity to do, rather than just painting. I make sculptures if necessary, or graphics and book covers if need be. I am an empirical person: I like holding, handling and touching everything. Being a slave to tactility, I feel things first and theorise about them later.
Sculpture with its raw materials and three dimensions is a more "corporeal" genre than the plane; sculptures provide a more plastic scope of expression for form and proportion than paintings or mathematics. The divine ratios and proportional forms exude irresistible power. Space without substance is an incomprehensible, unimaginable, dry, flavourless and odourless philosophical category which does not even exist in itself. Moulding materials into sculptures brings into existence a form of bewitching potency and unspeakable beauty. This is the inspiration of my plastic art; this is why I make sculptures.
I create my sculptures by combining and varying basic plane and solid forms. I build plane sculpture art out of plane forms, and solid objects out of three-dimensional forms. The solid, dense form is a matter of principle, since sculptures whose sides enclose hollow centres, resembling blown eggs, fall outside the boundaries of sculpture and are, theoretically, architectural creations. Sculptures consist either of open plane forms or of solid objects. This axiom is one of the diamond pivots of the world, and those who do not recognize this, or try to deny it, find themselves beyond the pale of art. This basic principle produces a visual language, free from all verbalism, ideologies and servility. My purpose in creating art is not to execute commissions, but to satisfy my own sense of beauty.
In my work I rely on modest amounts of materials and labour and focus, instead, on using modern media and techniques, considering their limitations and potentials and approaching my subject from an intellectual, objective and minimalist angle. I don't restrict myself to the most commonly used materials and techniques, such as bronze, wood, stone, casting and carving. Employing a variety of media and methods is important to me, since reliance on a single material and technique leads to a formal and artificial image for the artist. I consider the geometric form and its combinations as a means of dividing up the space.
The sculptures I made in the 1960s were form compositions cut and folded out of paper sheets. From an artistic point of view they are identical with the sculptures composed from plane elements and intended for outdoor spaces which I exhibited here in the Millenáris Park. These are not closed forms, not monuments which ring hollow inside, but plane shapes opening up into three dimensions which represent space and allow it to circulate freely. They derive from essential forms: I have tailored them from circles, squares and triangles, making sure that they refer back to their origins. They are carefully-considered, realistic, and easily-executed plastic art works, made of durable materials that are accessible in Hungary and constructed through simple, clean techniques without fancy applications. They are straightforward, minimalist creations.
There is nothing more to say; you have to see them. (János Fajó)
Biographical Notes
1937: Born in Orosháza, Hungary
1950–56: Joins the Békéscsaba Fine Arts Society while still at high school, his sole interests being drawing and painting.
1956-61: Graduates in decorative painting with honours from the Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts in Budapest.
1961–65: Studies aesthetics, art theory and philosophy and organises exhibitions at the Young Artists' Club.
1964–67: Studies under Lajos Kassák, being his only pupil.
1969: Travels across Western Europe with Kassák's widow, meeting Carl Laszlo in Basel, Victor Vasarely in Paris and Max Bill at the constructivist biennale in Nuremberg.
1971: Participates in the International Graphical Symposium in Soest, Germany, where he learns the technique of serigraphy.
1974: Establishment of the Pesti Műhely (Pest Workshop) and its publishing branch the following year.
1976: Becomes for the next 12 years the director of the Józsefváros Gallery, the first non-profit workshop-gallery in Hungary. During this period the gallery develops into an international forum, its profile ranging from experimental art to design.
1976: Embarks on an annual programme of leading summer schools, which forms an integral part of his work at the Pesti Műhely and the Józsefváros Gallery.
1976–80: Spends a month each year at the Rába Works.
1979: Awarded a prize at a wood sculpture exhibition in Cegléd.
1982: Takes over the management of the Pesti Műhely. In the years following 1984 he privately publishes portfolios of Kassák, Vasarely, Max Bill, Nicolas Schöffer, Gerstner, Pfahler and Linschinger, and turns his professional relationships into friendships.
1985: Awarded the Munkácsy Prize.
1989: Starts teaching at the Academy of Applied Arts.
1992: Marks the beginning of the period when his sculptural art reaches maturity. His small marble, metal, wood, bronze and plexiglass sculptures become known. Using cutting-edge technology, he starts making large-scale metal sculptures first at the German Binder company and later in Hungary.
1995: Executes a commission for Bácsborsod, the home village of László Moholy-Nagy, for a centenary memorial to the artist.
2000: Participates in the exhibition "With Art into the New Millennium" held on the Városliget pond. His entry is acquired by the Karsai Ltd in Székesfehérvár.
2002: His "Circle in Three Dimensions" is erected at the entrance of the Hotel Novotel in Budapest.
2003: Exhibits 15 of his large-scale plane sculpture art in the Millenáris Park in Budapest. Selected solo exhibitions 1968 • Fényes Adolf Gallery, Budapest
1969 • Fészek Club, Budapest
1971 • Galerie Minimax, Basel
1973 • Esztergom, Hungary
1975 • KKI Dorottya Gallery, Budapest
1980 • The Kossuth Lajos University Hall, Debrecen, Hungary
1985 • Centro Documentazione Artein, Rome
1988 • Galerie Eremitage, Berlin; Ost-West Galerie (with Max Bill), Zurich
1990 • Retrospective Exhibition, Műcsarnok, Budapest
1991 • Haus Ungarn, Berlin
1992 • Graf und Schelbe Galerie, Basel
1994 • Bilderhaus Bornemann, Lübeck
1995 • „New Sculpture”, Körmendy Gallery, Budapest; Galerie Haslinger, Vienna; Galerie von Bartha, Basel (Harasztÿ, Hencze)
1998 • Schöffer Museum, Kalocsa, Hungary
1999 • Erdész-Menshikoff Gallery, "Art Fair", Stockholm
2001 • Cultural Centre, Bucharest
2002 • Kulturinstitut Ungarn, Stuttgart
2003 • A.P.A. Gallery (with Imre Bak and Andy Warhol), Budapest; Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Wörlen, Passau; Millenáris Park, Budapest; Dürer Terem, Gyula, Hungary
************************************************************* I was trained as a painter. Form an early age, however, I have been attracted to three-dimensional forms such as balls and cylinders, which might explain why I became a sculptor-painter.
The sight of solid forms still fills me with enormous pleasure. As mental stimulants, beautiful, proportionate and shapely objects are my particular favourites, providing me with an irresistible urge to make sculptures. When this feeling engulfs me, it fills me with so many "plastic" ideas for sculptures that I am barely able to realise them.
I learnt the trade from masters, none of whom was a "remit artist". My first teacher, József Mokos in Békéscsaba, was a polymath and a comprehensive educator. The others who followed: Hincz, Kassák, Vasarely and Max Bill were also all universal artists, whose creativity was not bound by genres and categories, producing, as they did, door handles, kitchen stools, graphics, sculptures, paintings and whole buildings. Totality, optical entirety, was their remit.
Consequently, it has always come to me naturally to produce anything I fancied and had to the opportunity to do, rather than just painting. I make sculptures if necessary, or graphics and book covers if need be. I am an empirical person: I like holding, handling and touching everything. Being a slave to tactility, I feel things first and theorise about them later.
Sculpture with its raw materials and three dimensions is a more "corporeal" genre than the plane; sculptures provide a more plastic scope of expression for form and proportion than paintings or mathematics. The divine ratios and proportional forms exude irresistible power. Space without substance is an incomprehensible, unimaginable, dry, flavourless and odourless philosophical category which does not even exist in itself. Moulding materials into sculptures brings into existence a form of bewitching potency and unspeakable beauty. This is the inspiration of my plastic art; this is why I make sculptures.
I create my sculptures by combining and varying basic plane and solid forms. I build plane sculpture art out of plane forms, and solid objects out of three-dimensional forms. The solid, dense form is a matter of principle, since sculptures whose sides enclose hollow centres, resembling blown eggs, fall outside the boundaries of sculpture and are, theoretically, architectural creations. Sculptures consist either of open plane forms or of solid objects. This axiom is one of the diamond pivots of the world, and those who do not recognize this, or try to deny it, find themselves beyond the pale of art. This basic principle produces a visual language, free from all verbalism, ideologies and servility. My purpose in creating art is not to execute commissions, but to satisfy my own sense of beauty.
In my work I rely on modest amounts of materials and labour and focus, instead, on using modern media and techniques, considering their limitations and potentials and approaching my subject from an intellectual, objective and minimalist angle. I don't restrict myself to the most commonly used materials and techniques, such as bronze, wood, stone, casting and carving. Employing a variety of media and methods is important to me, since reliance on a single material and technique leads to a formal and artificial image for the artist. I consider the geometric form and its combinations as a means of dividing up the space.
The sculptures I made in the 1960s were form compositions cut and folded out of paper sheets. From an artistic point of view they are identical with the sculptures composed from plane elements and intended for outdoor spaces which I exhibited here in the Millenáris Park. These are not closed forms, not monuments which ring hollow inside, but plane shapes opening up into three dimensions which represent space and allow it to circulate freely. They derive from essential forms: I have tailored them from circles, squares and triangles, making sure that they refer back to their origins. They are carefully-considered, realistic, and easily-executed plastic art works, made of durable materials that are accessible in Hungary and constructed through simple, clean techniques without fancy applications. They are straightforward, minimalist creations.
There is nothing more to say; you have to see them. (János Fajó)
