HUNGARY IN CONTEXT STUDIES ON ART AND ARCHITECTURE Centrart_studies_2013.indb 1 2013.09.04. 11:10 Centrart_studies_2013.indb 2 2013.09.04. 11:10 HUNGARY IN CONTEXT STUDIES ON ART AND ARCHITECTURE Edited by Anna Tüskés, Áron Tóth, Miklós Székely Essays Júlia Bara, Mirjam Dénes, Zsombor Jékely, Anikó Katona, Petra Dóra Kárai, Nikoletta Koruhely, Beatrix Mecsi, Ágnes Mészáros, Flóra Mészáros, Tibor Rostás, Andrea Rózsavölgyi, Katalin Simon, Iván Szántó, Zsuzsanna Szegedy-Maszák, Ágnes Torma, Anna Tüskés, Ferenc Veress CentrArt, Budapest, 2013 Centrart_studies_2013.indb 3 2013.09.04. 11:10 Hungary in Context Studies on Art and Architecture CentrArt Association – New Workshop for Art Historians Th e publication of this book was made possible by the support of National Cultural Fund English language essays proofread by Viktória Szabó German language essay proofread by Virág Katalin Balogh Italian language essays proofread by Paolo Tellina French language essay proofread by Yves-André Gomez Illustrations Front cover: Ferenc Martyn: Composition. Budapest, Private Property. Oil on canvas. 97×196 cm. 1935. (Körmendi Gallery’s photo) Th e authors of the essays are responsible for the contents of their texts as well as for obtaining permission to reprint the images included in their essays. © Copyright 2013 by the editor, the authors and the photographers All rights reserved. Th is book may not be reproduced, in whole or part, without written permission from the publishers. ISBN 978-963-88825-3-0 Responsible publisher Miklós Székely President of CentrArt Association Page setting and cover design Gyula Papp, Pipaszó Bt. Printed in Hungary by print.shop.hu Ltd. Centrart_studies_2013.indb 4 2013.09.04. 11:10 Contents Beatrix Mecsi: One of the Earliest Paintings of Hungary: Mural Fragments from the Visegrád Decanal Church. 7 Tibor Rostás: Die Franziskanerkirche von Pozsega . 15 Zsombor Jékely: Painted Chancels in Parish Churches – Aristocratic Patronage in Hungary during the Reign of King Sigismund (1387–1437) . 41 Ferenc Veress: Scultori italiani nella corte del re Mattia Corvino (1458–1490). 59 Iván Szántó: Th e Royal and the Popular in Early Safavid Art. 67 Júlia Bara: “Regnavit Alexander et mortuus est.” Th e Funeral Ceremony of Sándor Károlyi in 1744 and its Art Historical Aspects . 79 Katalin Simon: Th e Iconostasis of the Greek Catholic Church in Szerencs . 101 Zsuzsanna Szegedy-Maszák: Th e Social Circle of Miklós Barabás at the Inception of his Career . 115 Ágnes Mészáros: Orientalising the Orient – Transforming Water-colours to a Lithographed Travel Album: Pictures by Count Iván Forray and Joseph Heicke. 127 Anna Tüskés: Mercanti veneziani e Wilhelm von Bode . 145 Mirjam Dénes: Shades of Japonisme in Hungarian Set and Costume Design Around the Turn of the 20th Century . 165 Ágnes Torma: Th e infl uence of Moorish Art in Hungarian Architecture at the End of the 19th century . 181 Petra Dóra Kárai: Apollinaire, chroniqueur des salons de Paris, sur les peintres fauves (et !) hongrois . 193 Anikó Katona: Ungarische Plakate des Ersten Weltkriegs: Ikonografi e der Propaganda – im internationalen Kontext . 211 Andrea Rózsavölgyi: 20 Years in Emigration: Emil Delmár and the Disintegration of His Collection . 225 Flóra Mészáros: Ferenc Martyn and the Parisian Abstract Art . 239 Nikoletta Koruhely: Behavioral Patterns of the Social Classes Th rough British Movies: A Close Reading of Billy Elliot. 255 Index . 275 Centrart_studies_2013.indb 5 2013.09.04. 11:10 Centrart_studies_2013.indb 6 2013.09.04. 11:10 One of the earliest paintings of Hungary 7 One of the earliest paintings of Hungary: mural fragments from the Visegrád decanal church¹ Beatrix Mecsi We know only little about the earliest paintings in Hungary, due to their rarity and frag- mentariness. Th erefore it was a great marvel when excavations in 1977-78 uncovered two 11th century buildings in Visegrád, near Sibrik Hill. Archeologists led by Mátyás Szőke found a small church with a semi-arched apse, and a later, square-ended one built over the fi rst building. Mural fragments were found on the excavated apse wall and a strip on the South wall – nine meters long and one meter high, continuing round onto the West wall. Th e decoration showed animal fi gures enclosed in circles and panels with imitations of marble. Apart from the in-situ frescos mentioned above, thousands of mural fragments were unearthed, where the author of this paper had been working since 1995, putting together the pieces of fresco-fragments and thus attempting to get a better understanding of the iconographical programme and stylistic relationships of these very early paintings. Th e paper is an introduction to this rich material for a better understanding of one of the earliest surviving paintings in Hungary. Th e town called Visegrád is located 30 kilometres North of Budapest, where the Danube cuts across the Visegrád mountains. Th e settlement is fi rst mentioned in a charter issued in 1009 for the Bishopry of Veszprém as part of the diocese. In this earliest source, the bishop referred to it as “Visegrad civitas”, ie. Visegrád county, the predecessor of the counties that later became Pest and Pilis.² Th is county, along with the counties of Esztergom located above and Fejér below it, covered the areas on both sides of the river Danube. Its seat was a castle converted from a late-Roman fortress on the Sibrik hill, called Visegrád (“higher-lying castle”) by the Slavs living in the neigh- borhood at the end of the 10th century.³ Th e fi rst parish church on Sibrik Hill was established along with the bailiff centre, which was set up in the early era of the Ár- pád dynasty. It was protected directly by the bailiff castle and its serfs. Parish priests launched the construction of churches with the help of bailiff s, and the two groups also acted together in enforcing Sunday as a public holiday, when everyone was required to go to church. Later, following the emergence and consolidation of the Church as an organisation, the parish priests based in the bailiff centres became the leaders of the episcopal districts.⁴ Th erefore, the earliest churches in Visegrád can be linked to the above mentioned region close to the Sibrik hill area, but soon further churches and monasteries were established in the region. Among these churches and monasteries the most interesting Centrart_studies_2013.indb 7 2013.09.04. 11:10 8 Beatrix Mecsi from the perspective of mural paintings is the one with the frescoes discovered on the Sibrik hill, East of the bailiff s’ castle at the side of the castle hill. Th is is the so-called decanal church dated from the 11th century, built on the walls of the St. Stephen era par- ish church. Th is paper is an introduction to this mainly unpublished material, which can be considered as one of the earliest high quality mural fragments from Hungary. The decanal church⁵ When the St. Stephen era parish church was replaced, they used it as a foundation for a larger church with a straight apse. Th e only nave of this latter church was divided into two parts by a timber apse screen. However, of this structure only the imprint of its sleepers in the South wall and the two postholes of its central door remained. (Fig. 1.) In the Eastern section, three altars were constructed. In front of the main altar, in a tomb covered by a stone slab, an aristocrat could have been buried – based on the size of the tomb, possibly a child. In the Western part, a wide chan- cel tower was elevated with an incorpo- rated celestory. Above two Corinthian columns of the ground fl oor underneath the celestory, the vault arches were held by shoulder stones decorated with carv- ings in the shape of a palmette.⁶ Onto the parapet of the fi rst fl oor, fi ve small, octagonal columns could have been placed according to Gergely Buzás’s reconstruction. Th ese columns might have supported the walls of the tower along the entire width of the nave, distributing the load on shoulder stones decorated by palmettes and ribbons. (Two fragments of the stone capitals were also published in the Pannonia Regia ex- hibition catalogue, cat. I-17, I-19).⁷ An external staircase led to the ce- Fig. 1. Ground-plan of the churches. Drawing: lestory from the South side, and a spiral Mátyás Szőke. Szőke, 1986, 7. staircase to the top fl oors of the tower. According to the observation and opinion of Gergely Buzás, the whole edifi ce to the West of the church was erected due to to a change of plans during the construction. Following the completion of the chancel of the church, the rich interior decoration was fi nished. (We can assume this as it is possible to observe traces of red painting on one shoulder cornice.) Centrart_studies_2013.indb 8 2013.09.04. 11:10 One of the earliest paintings of Hungary 9 Th ere was a veranda in front of the Southern gate of the church, used for burials. In some of its graves prestigious gold jewellery was found. One of these graves was covered by a sawed Roman column as a tombstone. In front of the Southern entrance of the veranda, a pile-structured timber house was erected. Traces of wooden build- ings of a similar structure were also found in front of the Western entrance hall. Graves belonging to the priests of the church were located behind the sanctuary. In one of their tombs, an 11th century tin cup and paten were discovered, whereas in another a penitence iron belt was found.⁸ Th e church cemetery was located to the West of the building. Among the coin fi ndings in the new cemetery tombs, which was separate from the old cemetery, the earliest ones belonged to King Solomon (1063–1074) and to Prince Géza.