 |
 Biography 1935- Born on December 26th, 1935, in
the village of Szentpéterúr, Zala County. 1954- Between 1954 and 1959 Paizs studies at the painting
and decorating faculty of the College of Applied Arts in Budapest.
His teachers are György Z. Gács, Lajos Szentiványi and Zoltán Rákosi. "I started out in a more or less parallel group to Lakner et al. We were very good friends, and spent a lot of time together. At the College of Fine Arts a person's teacher had an enormous influence on their work. At the College of Applied Arts - because we were just studying the craft - we were allowed to do other things. There was a freer atmosphere."7 (1983) During his college years and for some
time afterwards Paizs earns a living by painting still lifes for the
Képcsarnok Vállalat and by producing murals - executing designs by
Géza Fónyi, György Konecsni, György Z. Gács, Zoltán Rákosi and Endre
Domanovszky, and producing mosaics, sgraffiti, frescoes and seccoes.
1962 Takes part in the third exhibition of the Studio of Young Artists in the Ernst Museum in Budapest, with a painting entitled Demolishing the Elisabeth Bridge. 1964 While on a group tour to Rome and
Rimini, goes to the Venice Biennale, where the Pop Art works at the
American and Belgian stands make a great impression on him. 1966 Exhibits at the Studio of Young Artists show
in April. The show allows scope for a certain amount of experimentation,
and thus stirs up a furore in the press. Exponents of the new avant
garde are included: Sándor Altorjai, Imre Bak, András Baranyai,
Ilona Keserü, László Lakner, Sándor Molnár and Ludmil Siskov. Paizs'
works were non-figurative oils (Negative Forms, Composition). 2 Kernács Gabriella: "Úgy éreztem, hogy adva van végre a lehetőség, hogy utolérjem azt a századot, amelyben élek. Még csak nem is 1967-re gondoltam, csupán 1900-ra, vagy mondjuk 1910-re. De már ezt is óriási eredménynek éreztem és éreztük többen."2 (1978) 1967 His first one-man exhibition, of
graphics, opens in March at the Artists' Club in Gyôr.
In April he submits these works to be
exhibited by the Studio. The internal jury accepts them, and for a
short time the pictures are hung for display. Higher authorities call
for a correction, however. Before the exhibition opens around 50 works
by 25 artists are consigned to the storeroom, among them all the works
by Paizs. Paizs is deeply upset at having his work banished from the
realm of what is declared to be art. At more or less the same time
the commissions to produce decorative architectural pieces, which until
now have been a source of income, dry up. Three years later Paizs has another opportunity to travel abroad. A week-long trip to Paris gives him the chance to visit the Musée Cluny, the Louvre and the Impressionist collection at the Musée du Jeu de Paume. He also learns what is going on in contemporary art at the Musée d'Art Moderne and an international show entitled Lumičre et Mouvement. 1969 Paizs sets to work again. Knowing
that his textile works are gathering dust in a damp cellar, and wanting
to preserve them from rotting away to nothing, he begins casting around
for a material which could be used as a protective shell for perishable
works. Seeing insects preserved in plexiglass in the window display
of Tanért (a state shop) gives him the idea of using the material himself.
Plexiglass, a methyl-metacryl compound, is colourless, transparent,
unbreakable, light, and it solidifies at a low temperature. Following
the pioneering work of Pevsner and Naum Gabo at the beginning of the
century, plexiglass returned to experimental modern art in the sixties.
The raw material from which it is made, used principally in heavy industry, is very difficult to come by in Hungary, with the result that Paizs decides to make his own. Though plenty of experts tell him the enterprise is doomed to failure, he eventually succeeds, though not without a number of dangerous preliminary accidents. The first textile work to be encased in plexiglass (Embroidered Hip Pocket) is followed by works which encase a number of other materials (Black Eggs, Red Block, Green Block, The Post-Impressionist Painter's Nylon Shirt). The brutally crushed Czech revolution is commemorated in a work produced the following year, the 6.80 Shaving Mirror series. "I was making conscious fossils with these works. I had noticed an interesting thing about plexiglass. It is a medium which reduces everything to a similar value. As soon as they are embedded in plexiglass, objects lose their everyday value and turn into something else, something difficult to pin down. They lose their impermanence, they are given new value, they become timeless - and that's a very human yardstick, measuring value according to longevity."10 (1978) 1970 Exploded TV Tube, Unser Kaiser im
Gebet, The Crown Prince and Princess Have Been Murdered, Gauze Mushroom
Cloud 1971 Countdown, Truman and Attlee Announce
the Completion of the Atom Bomb 1972 In February, not long after the
closing of the exhibition in the Adolf Fényes Salon, an exhibition
of Paizs' plexiglass sculptures is put on in the Bercsényi út premises
of the Budapest Technical University, and opened by Imre Makovecz.
At the time these premises were being used as a safe bolt-hole for
a number of alternative arts events. 1973 Begins to produce plexiglass sculptures
reduced to geometric shapes, inspired by Minimal Art.
Regular square blocks and columnar cylindrical
shapes, purely geometric in structure, devoid of any object motif,
have parallel curved declivities and rows of circles etched into their
surfaces. The plexiglass blocks are polished to a mirror-like smoothness,
creating an effect of transparent bodilessness. 1974 Alongside the transparent methyl-metacryl
works, Paizs begins working with coloured polyester. The surface of
the polyester rectangles, spheres and cylinders is matt black, while
the scooped out insides are coloured red. 1976 In May a one-man exhibition of geometric
sculptures spanning the last two and a half years opens in the Csók
Gallery in Budapest. The regular cubes and spheres of the transparent
plexiglass and matt black polyester sculptures are displayed against
a sober black and white background. The exhibition is opened by Pál
Deim. 1977 Plexiglass and polyester are now
joined by a third material, metal. Paizs produces mainly geometric
figures, similar in spirit to what has gone before, but using heavy
blocks of chrome steel, aluminium and bronze. - Triple Chrome Column 1979 Geometric sculptures which Paizs has been working
on since the beginning of the decade now appear as decorative elements
in public places and on public buildings. Double Sphere, made of coloured
polyester, is erected at the Irottkô Hotel in Kôszeg. Three-Part Bronze
Sculpture appears in the Gundel restaurant, and Double Polyester Sculpture
is erected in Tárogató utca in Szeged. 1980 A seven-metre double column of chrome steel welcoming
people to the town of Zalaegerszeg is ceremonially unveiled in January. 1981 One-man exhibitions in Szeged and Zalaegerszeg. 1982 Copper Spatial Sculpture, a collaborative work with
Jenô Tatár, commissioned by the Hévíz Recreation Centre, is erected. 1983 Triple Suspended Sculpture, made of polyester, is
made for the Ságvári School in Hódmezôvásárhely. The coloured polyester
work entitled Sculpture, is erected outside the Hungarian People's
Army Cultural Centre in Szentendre. 1984 The coloured polyester work entitled Relief is produced for the Grand Hotel Hungaria in Budapest. 1986 Plexiglass and Brass Interior Partition Wall, made for the Grand Hotel Hungaria in Budapest (collaborative work with Károly Szabó). 1987 Exhibition of new works produced between 1985 and
1987 opens at the Műcsarnok in April. The cycle entitled European Fossils
are large-scale compositions paraphrasing classic European paintings,
and thus represent a return to the classical tableau-painting genre.
In contrast to the simplified geometric sculptures of the previous
year these works, depicting a negative cultural utopia, are characterised
by extreme structural complexity and richness of handling. Takes part in an exhibition entitled Old and New Avant Garde (1967-1975) at the King Stephen Museum in Székesfehérvár, the first show to undertake to chart the beginnings of the Hungarian neo-avant garde. 1988 One-man exhibition in the Pandora Gallery in Badacsonytomaj. 1989 One-man exhibition of "conscious fossils", produced
in the sixties, at the Qualitas Gallery. 1990 Bronze Relief, commissioned by the Hungarian Foreign
Ministry. 1994 In September an exhibition of new additions to the
European Fossils series, produced between 1989 and 1994, opens at the
Vigadó Gallery. 1997 In September, at an exhibition opened by Tibor Wehner
in the Pest Center Gallery, exhibits seven monumental graphics, the
first pieces in the Body Prints series, evoking classical torsos. 1999 Elected president of the Pál Szinyei Merse Society,
set up in 1992. 2000 Elected a member of the Hungarian Arts Academy. |
