Tóth Sándor (1992)

Sándor TÓTH is a sculptor, he was born in 1933 in Miskolc, a large city of North-Eastern Hungary. He finished his high school there and then studied at the Academy of Fine Art in Budapest between 1951-59. First he wanted to be painter, but later switched over to sculpture. His master, Zsigmond Kisfaludi-Stróbl, was greatly admired by Bernard Shaw. In addition to the great writer, he has also sculpted King George V. Sándor Tóth is at home in all forms of sculpture. Many of his open air sculptures are exhibited, like the latest one in Mariapócs which is a large bronze church gate. This statue shows that his most important idols were the great Renaissance Sculptors, Donatello and Ghiberti. It is not accidential, therefore, that he has won his first great international award in Firenze at the Georgio Vasari commemorative medal competition. During the period of this award his numismatic activity was quite significant. In addition to his Italian idols, he has learned a lot from studying the collection of the great Hungarian numismatists. He has learned the techniques of the struck and cast medals. Many commemorative coins of the Hungarian National Bank were designed by him in which he modernized the late Renaissance of XVTI-th century Transylvania. Most of the medals, however, were made whith the “casting” technique. Many hundreds of his works show his great professionalism, unique sense of scale, and his great ability to select the right type of letters and to arrenge them in an ingenious way. Most of his medals are the true image of his cultural sensitiveness, and admiration of the great artists and scientists. Each of his medals bears his personal and emotional touch because he takes interest in the sculptured theme and getting to know them on artistic, human and emotional bases. These works of his are giving the impression that the human is not only a destructive, subversive creature, but is able to establish harmony with the World fly into the World of idols and ideas away from the everyday problems where the only value is the humanity. If we take his medals into our palms, the wonder of art is opening up for us. We can feel the beauty, harmony, truth and humanity compressed into a few square inches. He achieves this artful complexity by always starting out from the reality. He finds their attractive and emotional sides, discovers and opens up their real value. The basis for his work - in addition to his excellent psychological and character observation abilities - is his great professional knowledge. The diligent, every-day activity has made his work well balenced and provided a strikingly marked style for his art. As a result he can work freely without any worry because he considers his duty to be the most attractive expression of the thought rather than to find the form to do it. Univ. Prof. Dr. Lajos Végvári Art historian

Next