Orosz Péter (2001)

ötven év If we look for the clue to the art of Péter Orosz, born in 1951, we have to think of one of Ins earliest sculptures, because with that one he immediately puts to words the essence of the aesthetics which actu­ally means the fundamentals of his oeuvre till now. This work is the Schmiile, exhibited at the Young Artists' Exhibition in 1981 in Sze­ged. The Schmiile (1980) is practically a billet of firewood cut into four parts., assembled again, re-build, citing the clumsy, rough and imperfect aesthetics of self-supporting peasant existence based on individual creativity. Though Orosz studied at an academy, he never applied, with some exceptions, what he learnt there. Rather he applied those recognitions he came to during his stay in Bulgaria, where he was a student between 1973 and 1978. He does not want to be an artist from the beginning. His elementary school teacher urges him. then at the secondary school he is also encouraged toward this direction. Despite he applies for the teachers' training school, to the faculty of drawing and geography. In the meantime he gets acquiant­­ed with young writers and poets, at that time literature attracts hime more. Later he gets into a close connection with József Ratkó and his circle of friends. They familirize him with the world of thought of Bartók. Thus Orosz, who in the meantime begins pleding himself to fine arts, came to the conclusion that the synthesis of Bartók is the real task in fine arts, too. Influenced by the poetry of László Nagy he stares in wonder at the folk art of the Balkans and Bulgaria. It seems to him, that thereby he can find there more archaic conditions he can get to folk art. as the source, easier. However, he must realize: what we call folk art. the 19th century peasant culture is already dead. It is impossible to resuscitate it, the experiment to continue it is anachro­nistic. Nevertheless he discovers a land, where individual creativity still lives, though its aestheticims is naive and incidental, that is fid­­ding around the house. Its most complex form is building the out­houses. barns, piggeries from wood constructions, to which the peas­ants never call a master to help, and which buildings have nothing to do with the regulations obligatory in case of building real houses. Neither the neighbouring village nor the environment is the pattern. There is no contest and comparison: this work is directed by expedi­ency and the aesthetics of one-time solutions, and the tradition runs in the family from father to son. This is the art of RUBRICATING, as Orosz says: the AESTHETICS OF THE PIGGERY. This piggery­fabricating still remained from folk art. creativity is present in joining by tenon and mortise of the wood, its binding solutions and in the construction. That's why Orosz says: "If the giraffe was our domes­tic animals, we would build wonderful towers." He looks at this world of form with love, which is beautiful in its use of material close to nature, and at the same time it makes us smile at its defencelessness and contingency. This elementary and natural method, learnt by close and secret observation from the piggeries, the fabricating 10

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