Winter Landscape with a Fence Sándor Ziffer

Sándor Ziffer met Béla Czóbel as a pupil of Simon Hollósy in 1906. Czóbel had called him to Nagybánya (today: Baia Mare, Romania), from where his path led straight to Paris. His sudden encounter with the latest French trends fundamentally determined his subsequent work: the Fauvist works at the Salon d’Automne, the commemorative exhibition of Paul Gauguin and allegedly Henri Matisse’s encouragment persuaded him to change his naturalist style established in Hollósy’s school. Back in Nagybánya, he created the cream of his oeuvre in 1907–1908, including landscapes and townscapes which are closer to Lajos Tihanyi’s works painted at that time than to Czóbel’s. Winter Landscape with a Fence captures a particular topographic site: a small street lined with miners’ houses winding towards the foot of Kereszthegy (Cross Hill). However unintentionally, the picture is like the summary of his career so far, since in the next years the artist’s interest turned increasingly to Germany, on account of his German wife. The cold blue contours, the contrasting glowing reds, the sharply drawn shadows in the oblique sunlight evidence his attempt at reviving naturalist landscape painting and the comprehension of the stylising, decorative approach of the Fauves and Gauguin at the same time. | György Szücs