October Károly Ferenczy

Károly Ferenczy’s paintings derive their spiritual tension and their emotional and intellectual power from their invocation of the combined harmonies of the senses; in his pictures, the human figures are perfectly at one with nature, though they always preserve their human integrity, stealing nothing away from nature. The reading man blends quite naturally into the splendid autumn landscape. He stands in shadow, fully absorbed, blissfully unaware of the outside world. He becomes a part of nature, not through degradation of form, but – quite the opposite – through his intellectual activity. The apples aligned on the table simultaneously evoke nature’s ability to produce beauty and the human desire to create order. Every detail is important to the composition, yet subordinate to the sum of all the others, and every motif maintains its individuality while submitting to a higher order. This approach to nature and to the world gives Ferenczy’s composition a certain emotional boost, which stands unparalleled in Hungarian painting.