NAGY, István
(1873, Csíkmindszent - 1937, Baja)

Grass Cutters

c. 1927
Pastel on cardboard, 50 x 68 cm
Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest

In István Nagy's second Transylvanian period, which began in 1925, there were very few compositions with figures in landscape, his attention was attracted to painting pictures of snow-capped mountains. "Grass Cutters" is a great example of the interdependence of labour and nature, landscape and man. Two persons are working in a monotonous rhythm in a motionless landscape rich in details. They are not heroes, only impersonal, co-ordinated elements of the view, like trees in the background. Nagy is not praising or celebrating eternal human activity, nor does he create conflicts on account of exhausting and soul-destroying work. Due to blacks, the monotonous green landscape becomes full of grief, suggesting resignation and acknowledgement of what cannot be changed. Misery of peasant lives is displayed with a sad monotony but there is no opposition or spirit of rebellion apparent. The picture, similarly to the artist's oevre, urges one to social jurisdiction. Dési Huber characterized the artist's attitude in appropriate words in 1937, "... there is no need for editorial art, there is no need for trends, it will do if one digs out reality and shows it, it will affect on its own ... One has to get hold of the roots and the artist has to show what cannot be expressed in words: visual horror."


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