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Oil painting on canvas or on wood fiber panel
Biography
István Orosz was born on 27 September 1953 in Bököny. But it is Nyírbogdány he considers as his native village. It is here that the painter grew up, did his primary studies and in mark of deference, he put the initial "B." (Bogdányi = of Bogdány) in front of his last name: István B. Orosz. During his secondary studies, the painter lived in Nyíregyháza and Debrecen: two big cities in the east of Hungary.
In 1969, the young István Orosz won second prize in Szabolcs - Szatmár County Artistic Competition. Between 1969 and 1972, he took courses of deepening in the "Studio" of András Beretz.
His meeting with László Félegyházi in Debrecen was decisive in his career. In the evolution of his art and style, the friendship and advice of the painter Gábor Lukács were also of crucial importance.
Today, István Orosz is a member of the National Union of Hungarian Painters, he is founder and president of the AKT (Amateur Fine Arts Society).
But he is not only a painter, he is also passionate about graphic and polygraphic art whose love has been bequeathed to him by Béla Szepessy, graphic artist living in Nyíregyháza.
His works have found "home" among Hungarian collectors and foreigners; they are found in various establishments such as cultural centers, private collections of artistic camps or in museums.
Ars poetica
Creation for me is getting close to the essence of surrounding world, the association sought on the surface, the vision creation using the materials at hand.
Living with the chances the materials provide I consciously control their behavior . That’s what poduces the end poduct, the - to the some extent spontaeniously produced - blur , shape. I find drawing skill particulary important, the knowledge accumulated in the fingers must at all time be kept alive Had I had the chance to define the essence of the sorrounding world, I would not ever try to paint it. In István Szőnyi’s words:
“ The closest we get to the essence of nature the further we get from nature itself .”
In my creativ life this is a process in wich I can not jump over steps or obstacles. The ones who shortcut the painful way that leads to knowledge are the ones who bluff in their works.” “ P arts of our environment become the building stones of pictures. They are reduced to colours and shapes. F or me it’s not the what but the how that’s the most important. My credo puts it this way:
“ What is important is not who you are, but who yuo want to become, someone, be someone, this is the aim, and the ones who get there, are the ones’ whose lives have not been wasted.”
By the eyes of the poet
The close-mouthhednes of Orosz István might as well be mystic, as there is some secrecy and association sought in his paintings as well. Although he mainly chooses to present us landscapes, natural and man made environments, the compositions he selects from nature, cities he paints these unique interiors with some unusual texturing and material handling. The presented - let it be drawing or matured paintings - is classically set and is developed into a decoratively colorful composition in this interpretation. In this neologism, is on the adjective earnestly decorative.
He favours warm as well as pastel shades, those that make the vision more attractive despite it’s cold atmosphere, and those that meanwhile open up the dream world that creates another reality right instantly. This imagery of reality - even when reflect upon identifiable reality - is produced out of the mixture of three kinds of realities such as: the actual, the abstract and the experienced realities. The mecina that has been created out of the image and atmosphere of the ever so often low profiled surrealistic, expressive dreams and impressions runs paralell in space with the seemingly unconscious, thought consciuusly controlled, artistically virtual free mecina.
Namely the actual, suppositional and the abstracted, world come alive in his works and these abstractions are soaked with sensitivity and fine lyric. Behind lyricism there hides the prolific emotion of the soul as well as the unique tension of withholding, and in his closed mouthednessone would feel his search for compromise. With the calmnes of visual expressionism ripens the dare, the sadness, the vibrating gestures and the silence. Those to become power and emotion-provoking colors, but often one might have the strange feeling of hearing the sound behind. All of these qualities bring plasticity besides the earlier mentioned decorativity.
One can feel the desire to touch his pieces of art. When presented, he is the master of shaping them so that they seem to be touchable. This is however in the dimensions of soul relationship, that is to filled with content in the area in between the picture and the recipient. The painter often doesn’t want to grab the unusual or the unique. His dreaminess is rather more impressive, mood oriented, than leaning towards surrealism. He is the constant search for simple, everyday qualities. He feels the positively charged emptiness with the delicacy of poetry like spontaneity.
Ferenc Vitéz
poet
"There are untold blushes of dawn
which have not yet arisen." (Rigveda)
Could one ever find a more beautiful thought in the preface of a catalogue that the one cited in the line above? This is the thought that sustains artistic volition and, on the other hand, ever calls visitors to art galleries. This concept gives the reason why the ambitions of various artistic tendencies to erase museums were all in vain - these efforts themselves got into museums instead. In vain was politicians’ hysteria endeavouring to subjugate arts into servitude and in vain is negation at present expressed either in astonishing ideologies which even put self-mutilation on the pedestal of arts or in the activity of certain TV companies which make use of cruel tragedies to appease hunger for information and attend on hunger for spectacle developed by horrors which cannot be enhanced even by action films any more. All is in vain for artists remain artists as well as human beings altogether.
Their imagination, in the most favoured moments, by emotion and sensibility, enables the recipient to live a more affluent and wealthier life for a while in perpetually changing history. Nowadays, however, like all people artists have got to face an acute crisis which arises from the increasingly explosive complexity of our century. Real and political empires have collapsed, war has become manifest in our immediate vicinity, not to speak about delinquency or the daily worries of everyday life. An artist of creative mind has to accept the challenge, make a survey of it and treat it with his fellow-beings - he himself has to undergo a transformation so as to be able to transform and recreate his surroundings and he does not only have to revive himself but also the domain of the process of creation. Such an artist is István B. Orosz.
He does not only join in artistic work as an organizer arranging exhibitions and organizing colonies of painters but he also lives the life of an artist who has to bring about artistic value as against „hamburger and mickey-mouse culture” falling on to us. As Prometheus stole fire for people, painters steale beauty into our lives. Since we need beauty immensely in the dreariness of our days. István B. Orosz derives from his birthplace, his homeland proper, his schools and the generative atmosphere in colonies of artists. From the especially hectic life of the previous decade, it is neither the reflexion of vexation or disintegration nor the slowly aging „novel” reaction of mocking scandalizing or the doctrinal claim to construct something new at any cost that he represents in his art.
Instinctively , he withdraws into an inner world characteristic of his personality and he draws the spectators of his pictures with him as well. This inner world is, first of all, a world of beauty and clarity . His delicate and always clear works of art often full of presentiment hiding secrets and recalling our ancestors’ world into memory suggest harmony , humanism and the existence of real beauty . This inner world is a world of fairness which is primarily expressed in his meaningful interiors.
Where does this world come from?
His paintings make us, the viewers, cast our souls back on our own not-so-long- ago past. Since, perhaps, every one of us cherish memories about a fabulous world of fragrant air about beds built high out of grandmothers’ pillows whipped with care, tablecloths washed and ironed snow-white frothy , draws of chests packed with treasures, chests of drawers pure like tabernacles with the portraitgallery constituted by the fading photographs of the members of the family treasuring secrets or about festive rooms with their peacefulness of devotion inside. Lives, pleasures, sorrows and tragedies hide in the details of his pictures and make us remember our past and ask ourselves whether we did everything that we could and that was worth doing. Can our grandparents still sit down outdoors in the verandah in the afternoon sun? Will our children have the chance to remember the water of the river Tisza - and not only from poems?
That is why the world depicted in these paintings does not yet sound a knell and these works of art cannot only be considered as mere documents. It is not up to the painter. What he creates is an integral part and continuation of the best traditions as far as either the attitude of the artist or the concept of the pieces are concerned. In István B. Orosz’s pictures, besides ancient ruins and Renaissance buildings recalling the past and history , even modern cities represent a pictorial treatment as the artist softens the earsplitting noise of our rushing age into the tranquillity of delicate colours and decaying forms as if , at least in the realm of painting, he ennobled iron, steel and concrete blocks to make worthy companions of the values of the past. In his paintings, even this swarming torrent becomes humanized. It is just natural that, in this pictorial world, nature also gains ground. The seasons of the year with their ethereal or severe beauty , flowers with their gracefulness. Both in his larger and in his smaller pictures, the painter’s fundamental principle is the classical composition and the atmosphere is determined by his decorative, subtly-woven, harmonic colouring. Now we can get acquainted with the works of an artist who respects the mastery of the profession and considers it important to attain full knowledge if it - also expressing his respect to the spectator in this way .
Gábor Lukács
Painter