Horváth László szobrászművész (Páka, 1999)

The Exhibition of László Horváth Fiat lux!... (Let there be light...) I am con­vinced that these godly words mean far more than the divine intent which divides light from darkness. In another sense, light can be substituted by order, that is by God, wanting to seize the aboriginal disorder, in order to create order, clarity, and purity instead. We can find something similar to this in László Horváth’s art. He also wants to create light, order, and purity in our disorderly, hazy, world. Probably this is why he is at home in the circle of neo-constructivists, as well. The sense of home is far more than an intellectu­al connection. It has the dual sense of both the roots and the method of creating. The common roots are basically manifested in the respect and maintenance of the intel­lectual legacy of his master, Tibor Csiky. On the other hand, the community of art is incor­porated in a relatively stable behavior of the artist community. In this unique presentation of László Horváth, practically every single piece of his art carries his peers’ intellect as well. For the present exhibition in Zalaeger­szeg, László Horváth has come up with an intellectual presentation greater than ever before, to the extent that we can describe his collection as retrospective. The exhibition material covers all areas of his twenty-five­­year old career, including prints, small sculp­tures, medals, and jewelry. There are several items which have not been displayed before. The present exhibition offers a more compre­hensive insight into the artist’s world view than any other previous show has. It is Horváth’s drawings that testify his progress most distinctively, since there is a ten-year gap between the two cycles of the 1970’s and the 1980’s. His graphics of the 1970’s include rigorously constructed geo­metrical motives of emblematic simplicity while his more recent works maintain the same principles of composition in a less strict matter. The artist handles surfaces with greater sensitivity. His surfaces are sur­rounded by broken contours and take up just a small proportion of the actual surface. The appearance of colors in Horváth’s latest works results in clearer associations and an increased artistic effect. This alarms Horváth since it takes him beyond his circle of observation and perhaps even beyond his intentions. Probably this is why in his most recent drawings of 1998 he returns to the dissection of the pure problems of form, doing away with colors altogether. Horváth’s sculptures guide us to a world of purity, precision, accuracy, and elegance. His base forms are geometrical: triangles, pyra­mids, and crosses, which he can vary with surprising profusion. As far as their materials are concerned, they can carry sharp con­trasts. The generally smooth, dull, planes, which are red, black or sometimes glowy chrome steel surfaces, are additionally com­plemented with naturally looking, broken, wooden planes of rusty or decayed appear­ance. With simplicity Horváth moves from one form to another plane, and matches con­trasting materials to show his penchant for changing chaos into order. Horváth’s medals have launched a new era in the rich history of Hungarian medal art by broadening the limits of techniques. They comprise broken, rusty, etched, and some­times ’’naturally” cracked-surfaced pieces of chrome steel, which sometimes change into a variety of form and recall topographical fig­ures. They associate the dualities of land and sea with light and darkness, along with the fiction of completeness which is present in a small piece of the macrocosm in an astonoshingly artistic way. His jewelry remains within the frames of his sculptural language, but in addition to form, Í it also maintains the purity of the material. Horváth pairs the analysis of the problems of form with aesthetics, which is indispensable £, in case of jewelry. As a result, his works turn into autonomous values of sculpture. The artist has successfully achieved his goal of turning chaos into order. ' ...Et facta est lux (....and there was light.) by László Kostyál KjS, ■»Wt 1PÄ22

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