Károly Ferenczy (February 8, 1862 – March 18, 1917) was a Hungarian painter and leading member of the

Nagybánya artists' colony The Nagybánya artists' colony was an art colony in Nagybánya, a town in eastern Hungary that became Baia Mare in Romania after World War I. The colony started as a summer retreat for artists, mainly painters from Simon Hollósy's ''szabadiskola' ...

.Ilona Sármány-Parsons
"Károly Ferenczy"
Oxford Art Online He was among several artists who went to

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

for study in the late nineteenth century, where he attended free classes by the Hungarian painter,

Simon Hollósy Simon Hollósy; (2 February 1857, Máramarossziget (now Sighetu Marmației, Romania) – 8 May 1918, Técső (now Tiachiv, Ukraine) was a Hungarian painter of Armenian ancestry; original name was: Choriban (Korbuly).Gudenus János József:Ör ...

. Upon his return to Hungary, Ferenczy helped found the artists colony in 1896, and became one of its major figures. Ferenczy is considered the "father of Hungarian impressionism and post-impressionism" and the "founder of modern Hungarian painting."''The Retrospective Exhibition of Károly Ferenczy (1862-1917)''
30 November 2011 - 17 June 2012, Hungarian National Gallery, accessed 30 January 2013 He has been collected by the

Hungarian National Gallery The Hungarian National Gallery (also known as Magyar Nemzeti Galéria), was established in 1957 as the national art museum. It is located in Buda Castle in Budapest, Hungary. Its collections cover Hungarian art in all genres, including the works ...

, which holds 51 of his paintings, as well as other major and regional institutions, including the Ferenczy Károly Museum, founded in his birthplace of

Szentendre Szentendre () is a riverside town in Pest County, Hungary, between the capital city Budapest and Pilis Mountains, Pilis-Visegrád Mountains. The town is known for its museums (most notably the :hu: Szentendrei Szabadtéri Néprajzi Múzeum, Open- ...

, and private collectors. In 1966 the Hungarian National Gallery had a major exhibition of the colony's work: ''The Art of Nagybánya. Centennial Exhibition in Celebration of the Artists' Colony in Nagybánya.''Valerie Majoros, "Lajos Tihanyi and his friends in the Paris of the nineteen-thirties"
''French Cultural Studies'', 2000, Vol. 11:387, Footnote, p. 388, Sage Publications, accessed 30 January 2013 In November 2011, it opened a large retrospective of Ferenczy, featuring him for six months, to enable more viewers to appreciate the breadth of his work.

Early life and education

Károly Ferenczy was born in 1862 to a Hungarian-Jewish familyAdrian M. Darmon, ''Autour de l'art juif: Encyclopédie des peintres, photographes et sculpteurs''
Paris: Carnot, 2003, p. 240, accessed 1 February 2013 in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. His mother died soon after he was born."The Ferenczy Family"
''The Retrospective Exhibition of Károly Ferenczy (1862-1917)'', 30 November 2011 - 17 June 2012, Hungarian National Gallery, accessed 2 February 2013 He first studied law and completed a degree from the College of Economy.
Fine Arts of Hungary, accessed 2 February 2013 His future wife,

Olga Fialka Olga Fialka (1848-1930) was an Austro-Hungarian artist and matriarch of the Ferenczy family of artists. Biography Olga Fialka was born on 19 April 1848 in Theresienstadt. She studied painting under Jan Matejko in Kraków. She went on to study un ...

, encouraged Ferenczy to explore painting and he traveled in Italy. After studying in Paris in 1887 and starting to paint in Hungary, in 1893 he took his young family to

. They lived there until 1896, while he studied with the Hungarian painter

and the circle of young artists around him.

Marriage and family

He married Olga Fialka, also a painter. He went to study at the

Académie Julian The Académie Julian () was a private art school for painting and sculpture founded in Paris, France, in 1867 by French painter and teacher Rodolphe Julian (1839–1907) that was active from 1868 through 1968. It remained famous for the number a ...

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

in 1887. In 1889 he and his wife settled in

, a small town near Budapest. They had two sons and a daughter together: Valér (b. 1888) and Béni and Noémi, fraternal twins born in 1890. Olga gave up her painting to support her family and husband's career. Among Ferenczy's 51 works held by the

are portraits of his children, including one of the three of them as young adults, and one of Noémi and Béni at age 18. All the children became artists; Valér became a painter, Noémi founded modern Hungarian tapestry, in which she became a "master", and

Béni Ferenczy Béni Ferenczy (18 June 1890 – 2 June 1967) was a Hungarian sculptor, medalist and graphic artist. Early life and education Béni Ferenczy was born in 1890 in Szentendre, Hungary, the second son of Károly Ferenczy and Olga Fialka, both ...

became a sculptor.

Career

In Hungary, Ferenczy started painting in a naturalistic style, as he had been influenced by

Jules Bastien-Lepage Jules Bastien-Lepage (1 November 1848 – 10 December 1884) was a French painter closely associated with the beginning of naturalism, an artistic style that emerged from the later phase of the Realist movement. His most famous work is his lan ...

. Seeking more training, he took his young family with him to Munich in 1893, the art center of Central and Eastern Europe. They lived there until 1896. There he encountered

, a Hungarian painter not much older than he, who ran free classes that were more open to new influences than those at the

Munich Academy The Academy of Fine Arts, Munich (german: Akademie der Bildenden Künste München, also known as Munich Academy) is one of the oldest and most significant art academies in Germany. It is located in the Maxvorstadt district of Munich, in Bavaria, ...

. Hollósy encouraged an appreciation of French painters and their techniques, including ''

en plein air ''En plein air'' (; French for 'outdoors'), or ''plein air'' painting, is the act of painting outdoors. This method contrasts with studio painting or academic rules that might create a predetermined look. The theory of 'En plein air' painting ...

'' painting. Ferenczy met the young Hungarian artists

István Réti István Réti (26 December 1872 – 17 January 1945) was a Hungarian painter, professor, art historian and leading member, as well as a founder and theoretician, of the Nagybánya artists' colony, located in what is present-day Baia Mare, ...

and

János Thorma János Thorma (24 April 1870 – 5 December 1937) was a Hungarian painter. A representative figure of the Nagybánya artists' colony, which started in 1896, in Nagybánya, Austria-Hungary (today Baia Mare, Romania), He moved through differ ...

in Hollosy's circle in Munich, and the men collaborated on their ideas. Returning to Hungary in 1896, Ferenczy joined Réti and Thorma at Nagybánya, and they persuaded Hollósy to bring his classes there. They founded an artists' colony in Nagybánya (today

Baia Mare Baia Mare ( , ; hu, Nagybánya; german: Frauenbach or Groß-Neustadt; la, Rivulus Dominarum) is a municipality along the Săsar River, in northwestern Romania; it is the capital of Maramureș County. The city lies in the region of Maramureș ...

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

) where they taught and mentored many Hungarian artists. Even in the first years, Ferenczy had a studio in Budapest during the winter, which he maintained throughout his career. Ferenczy's first exhibit in 1903 in Budapest marked his entry into making a living as an artist. In 1906, the painter was offered a teaching position at the Hungarian Royal Drawing School, now the

Hungarian University of Fine Arts The Hungarian University of Fine Arts ( Hungarian: ''Magyar Képzőművészeti Egyetem'', MKE) is the central Hungarian art school in Budapest, Andrássy Avenue. It was founded in 1871 as the Hungarian Royal Drawing School ''(Magyar Királyi Min ...

. He returned to Nagybanya in summers to teach, and has been strongly associated with the colony. His studio paintings were most important to his art, and he painted a traditional array of genres: nudes, still lifes, the urban scenes of circus performers. By his own work and his teaching, Ferenczy is considered the "father of Hungarian impressionism and post-impressionism" and the "founder of modern Hungarian painting." In his later years, Ferenczy painted subjects ranging from portraits, to nudes, and Biblical scenes.Nóra Veszprémi, "Painting Unmentionable Love: Károly Ferenczy’s Homoerotic Aestheticism"
Hungarian Art History blog, 8 May 2012, accessed 30 January 2013 In this period, " e reconciliation of the abstract aesthetic ideal with sensual beauty became a central concern of his art." Ferenczy was highly productive, and he worked in a variety of materials and genres. In November 2011, a major retrospective exhibition opened for six months at the

, featuring nearly 150 paintings and 80 prints and drawings, together with about 50 documents (photographs, letters, catalogues and books) related to his art and life. It was the first major exhibit of his work in nearly a century. The works were drawn from private holdings as well as public collections.

Exhibits

*2011
''The Retrospective Exhibition of Károly Ferenczy (1862-1917)''
30 November 2011 - 17 June 2012, Hungarian National Gallery''Ferenczy Károly (1862-1917) gyűjteményes kiállítása'' (The Retrospective Exhibition of Károly Ferenczy), eds. Judit Boros and Edit Plesznivy, Budapest: Hungarian National Gallery, 2011 *200
"Munich in Hungarian, Hungarian Artists in Munich 1850-1914, 2 Oct 2009 - Jan 2010"
Hungarian National Gallery *1991-1992, ''Standing in the Storm: The Hungarian Avant-Garde from 1908-1930,'' Santa Barbara Museum of Art,

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara ( es, Santa Bárbara, meaning "Saint Barbara") is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coas ...

Papers published in ''Hungarian Studies'', Vol. 19, No. 1-2, 1994, accessed 2 February 2013
/ref> *1966, ''The Art of Nagybánya. Centennial Exhibition in Celebration of the Artists' Colony in Nagybánya.''

Legacy and honours

*1972, the Ferenczy Museum was founded in Szentendre, to honour all the artists in the family, an effort led by his daughter-in-law Erszi Ferenczy, widow of Béni. (It is now named the Ferenczy Károly Múzeum, after the most prominent member.) *1993, the Ferenczy Family Foundation was set up by Erszi Ferenczy to preserve the works of the family and educate people about them.

Gallery

File:Ferenczy, Károly - Boys Throwing Pebbles into the River.jpg, ''Boys Throwing Pebbles into the River'' (1890) File:Ferenczy Madárdal.jpg, ''Birdsong'' (1893) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Orpheus (1894).jpg, ''Orpheus'' (1894) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Archeology (1896).jpg, ''Archaeology'' (1896) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Sermon on the Mountain (1896).jpg, ''The Sermon on the Mount'' (1896) File:Ferenczy, Károly - The Three Magi (1898).jpg, ''The Three Magi'' (1898) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Joseph Sold into Slavery by his Brothers (1900).jpg, ''Joseph Sold into Slavery by His Brothers'' (1900) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Isaac´s Sacrifice (1901).jpg, ''Abraham's Sacrifice'' (1901) File:Károly Ferenczy (1862-1917) Evening in March (1902).jpg, ''Evening in March'' (1902) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Deposition from the Cross (1903).jpg, ''Deposition from the Cross'' (1903) File:Ferenczy Október 1903.jpg, ''October'' (1903) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Painter and Model (1904).jpg, ''Painter and Model'' (1904) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Morning Sunshine (1905).jpg, ''Morning Sunshine'' (1905) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Riding Children (1905).jpg, ''Riding Children'' (1905) File:Károly Ferenczy painter (1862-1917) Béni and Noémi.jpg, ''Béni and Noémi'' (1908) File:Ferenczy, Károly - Red Wall (1910).jpg, ''Red Wall'' (1910)

Notes

External links

Works by Károly Ferenczy
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ferenczy, Karoly 1862 births 1917 deaths Artists from Vienna Hungarian Impressionist painters Hungarian realist painters Burials at Kerepesi Cemetery Academic staff of the Hungarian University of Fine Arts 19th-century Hungarian painters 19th-century Austrian male artists 20th-century Hungarian painters Hungarian male painters 19th-century Hungarian male artists 20th-century Hungarian male artists