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JOVÁNOVICS, György Sculptor (Budapest 3rd April, 1939 - ) 1957-1960: Hungarian College of Fine Arts, Budapest, masters: József Somogyi, later: Sándor Mikus. 1964-1965: Akademy für Angewandte Kunst, Vienna, master: Knesl Hans. 1965: Acad. des Beaux-Arts Paris, master: H. G. Adam. 1971: scholarship holder in Essen, by the Fokwang Museum. Between 1980 and 193 he lived and worked in Berlin as a DAAD Scholarship holder. In 1988 he worked at the Bildhauerwerkstatt of West Berlin, as a scholarship holder of Phillip Morris. He has been a professor at the College of Fine Arts in Budapest since 1991. 1990: Outstanding Artist Award; 1997: Kossuth Award. Jovánovics lives and works in Budapest. It can most probably be said that Jovanovics is the artist from the end of the 1960’s, of the IPARTERV-group, who is related in the most consistent form to the paradigms of both Hungarian and universal art of his period. He worked as a sculptor, yet in a manner, that his primary theme was light, and was interested in the majority of his works with the relationship between minimalist plastic surfaces, relief works, and the light shed upon them. His sculpturing work was conducted the most significant structural forms of architecture into the objects and spatial systems created by him with the most elemental level of naturalism. This is such, since the manner in which he places his works into the surrounding spatiality, the space never being accidental, rather the stipulation of a special system of relations, be it an inner or an outer space, therefore each of his works may also be conceived as an installation work. Being a sculptor, he also considers the usage of any other tool or device acceptable in his works, such as photographs, film, music, and video. His early, first significant work, entitled: Részlet a Nagy Gillesből (Detail from the Grand Gilles) (1967) is a unique mixture of mythology and history. Firstly it is a remebrance of Watteau, an outstanding moment of culture, secondly it is a heroically ironic attitude, adequate with the production, place and time of the sculpture: detail here means a malformed torso segment: a figure missing from lower leg downwards, and from hip-up. Hungarian torso, from 1967. His work entitled Fekvő figura (Laying Figure/ (1969), which he introduced at the 2nd IPARTERV exhibition, is a mixture of modeling, marking and molding, the unique Jovanovics-like mixture of minimal and pop art. His installation special systems of the beginning of the 1970’s took upon themselves the materials of drapery and relief works, the prints and marks of reality, as well as the issue of philosophical abstraction. The first formulation of this new concept was the two piece, table-tablecloth environment introduced at the Adolf Fényes Gallery, in 1970, its continuing was the relief-installation system composed of window, wall and wooden frame of Essen. He prepared his photographic series - light montage entitled Liza Wiathruck: HOLOS GRAPHOS in the year of 1974, in which he summarized his entire work up until then, furthermore he stated his new artistic program, in which he positioned realistic and illusionist spaces, the system of philosophical surfaces at the center of his art. Besides his multi-sidedness, he unyieldingly made use of a single material: that of plaster. Except for a small number of works prepared during his early career all the works prepared by Jovanovics were constructed from plaster. It must also be mentioned that such large-scale significant works of his erected in public spaces, as the 56-os Mártírok Emlékműve (Memorial of the Martyrs of 1956) at the 301st parcel of the Public Cemetery of Budapest was constructed of rock, while the Trójai papírgyár (Paper Factory of Troy) found in the Olympic Park of Seoul, was constructed from white concrete. There is also another consequence of the above, that with the exception of a few works, such as the Színes relief (Colored Relief) series, almost all of his works are white. The white color in the world of art constitutes a strongly mythical absolute occurrence. On the surfaces brought forth by Jovanovics, be those either relief works, or geometrical forms placed into special contexts, the white color, without shades, or layers, acts as a spiritual effect, engulfing every other motif. He is a sculptor, however he attempts to avoid all grand-scale and heroic forms, at times surfaces on his relief works are solely a few millimeters high, his devices are reduced to a level of near Puritanism. Jovanovics’s basic mentality and sculpturing work are always in close unison with the universal art of the period. From a sculpturing perspective his work entitled Az 1956-os Forradalom mártírjainak emlékműve /The Memorial of the Martyrs of the Revolution of 1956/ is considered his most major work, which works as a sanctuary, a spatial fitting, as well as a sculpture collection, all in one. In this work of his all of the elements of his artistic career are present, plastic, philosophical, as well as environmental. Surfaces and materials are richly worked (soft, white draperies on the marble sarcophagi, the rustic, un-carved natural stone, the polished, stone walls with chipped edges, the black stele of the six-sided crypt), furthermore the special environments and relationships between the inner and outer are a result of form producing qualities of Jovanovics. His work entitled Nekropolis is not only a unique sculpturing work in itself, but also a significant philosophical statement. Jovanovics held two summarizing exhibitions during the middle of the 1990’s: the first of these was presented at the Hungarian Pavillion of the Biennial of Venice in 1995. Firstly, Jovanovics, who was not at all fond of grand summarizing exhibitions, presented his works starting from those prepared during the course of the 1960’s, up until the time. Secondly, under the influence of the spirit of the location, he created two further works as a paraphrasing of the work entitled Tempesta (Storm), by Giorgione, and the works exhibited at the Academy of Venice. The work entitled Nagy Hasáb (Grand Column) recalled the the building on the farther bank of the river, while his Részlet a Nagy Viharból (Detail of the Large Storm) invoked the Roman garve segment found on the left side of the image. The quote itself was found two kilometers from the original. The location thus found its place with precision. However, not even Jovanovics could avoid the fate of the tempest, collective memory failed to work, thus there were only a few who noticed the reference and understood it. In the summer of 1996 in the Church quarters of the Fővárosi Képtár/Kiscelli Múzeum (Municipal Gallery / Kiscelli Museum) under the politely put Latin title of Ut manifestius atque apertius dicam (So that the weaker may understand), the meaning of was again missed, due to the passing of the Latin Historia (yet again, another provocative negative memory case), he placed the works which were at location in Venice, to a new site. The artist projected the image of the Tempesta, lost from the collective memory, with a video projector behind the double broken brick column of the Részlet a Nagy Viharból (Detail from the Large Storm). Jovanovics’s quote and the original thus met one another. Furthermore in order to ensure that memory and history gain true meaning, the characters of the Giorgione image, the woman, and the male figure leaning on the spear, within the framework of the video installation gained voices. The new location found for these works transformed the works in a spiritual manner, brining forth complicated quote planes. Giornione’s image was projected onto the bare, uncovered brick wall of the 18th Century church, multiplied in size to manifold its original’s, and animating its figures, quoted the original in a manner, that before it stood Jovanovics’s sculpture. The work constituted a column of the antique pillar motif, in the dime light, with its mystic shadows, these being the planes of reality, and this special composition was projected through an industrial camera, onto the forefront of the church, where the Nagy Hasáb (Grand Column) stood. The extremely complex set of quotations and references, in which planes of time, built on one another, referring to each other, as well as the real and imitated spaces, could be interpreted as a single work, and may be perceived as a summarization of the whole of Jovanovics’s career up till this day. (translated by: Vladimir Végh)