My art is inseparable from the coping after survival and from the gesture and actions of healing and from the love of animals. These transformations have creative potential. Because traumas must be transformed into steps of community building, common development and connection.
In 2003, I obtained my first degree (BA) in teaching with a minor in music. I earned my second degree, an MA, in pedagogy and Hungarian literature in 2008. I’ve been writing poems since 2010.
The post-communist Hungary, where I was born and which is now becoming a competitive authoritarian system, restricts artists' self-expression and existential safety in many ways. As a result, I lost my connection to art for almost a decade and a half. For a long time, I worked with the rehabilitation of traumatized dogs. In January 2024, my husband and I emigrated to Finland.
Since then, I have been teaching myself to draw and paint. The endless pine forests, exploring the archipelago, and the atmosphere of the harbors fill me with joy. I want to leave as small ecological footprint as possible, even in my creative work. That's why oil pastels and water-soluble paints appeal to me.
It is important to support the abused so that they can become survivors from victims. It is important that they have autonomy and a future. It is important that everyone has their own dignified life.
That's why my vision is to define the pieces of reality, to put them in context, to help us face them. My vision is a society where discourse on human rights is unnecessary because free participation, choice of profession, security, equality, and work-based wages free from discrimination are fundamental and integral parts of public thinking.
The more space we give to creation and the thinking that goes with it, the more people will find words and ways to express their emotions and experiences. They will be able to broaden their horizons and demonstrate their values. Belonging to a community gives joy. Art provides affirmation, friendships and a supportive atmosphere that relieves loneliness. We all want to belong to others. We want recognition. A life full of dignity and opportunities.
I think these are the building blocks of healthy personality development and, indirectly, of societies becoming adults and responsible. I would like to encourage and support my fellow women by sharing my story. To put the importance of women's and animal rights into discourse.
Next Time It Happens…
This painting is part of a series I am currently working on. I am examining the possibilities of living entities to create connections across their own boundaries. Sometimes visually focusing on the boundaries and events of the geographical, sometimes the microworld. This time I am observing the connection of living entities to older versions of themselves and also giving space to the transcendent (re)encounters of beings who love each other.
I used ink, water-soluble wax pastel and acrylic paint. For me, the combination of these liquid materials can be perfectly corresponds to the changeability of human states of being.
My work depicts multiple interpretations of boundaries. On the one hand, the recorded documentation of developmental and physical states that can be experienced during a lifetime mark a physical boundary. At this point, of course, the question immediately arises: is a living being able to connect to its previous, always imperfect versions, forms and contents or not? Is this a supportive or judgmental connection?
On the other hand, the boundary between generations becomes conscious. This gives the individual additional possibilities for connection; they can connect to ancestors, themselves, descendants, or even all directions at once. While genetic inheritance, geographical determinations, or even unprocessed transgenerational traumas are constantly at work.
Where the connection between beings who love each other is in focus, the transcendental aspect inevitably appears. And some questions: is the boundary the comfort zone? Are the boundaries the difficulties? Is the boundary being in the present?
I consciously use the term “living entity”. In this series, my subjects are cells, animals, humans, plants, and fantasy creatures.
One of the hardest realizations during my work with my therapist was the encounter with my own former child self. I had to realize that for decades I had covered up with academic and professional success, with apparent self-confidence, with my once excellent ability to use my native language that terrified, unmoving, infinitely lonely little girl, whom I never gave the acceptance of her flaws, her vulnerability. Nor my encouraging love. Without these, I cannot be who I really am. And I cannot become who I can really become. I am changing. I no longer have the strength to play a role and remain silent. Just as I do not have the strength to maintain relationships that would be based on role-playing or silence.
I have to step outside my own mental comfort zone and reconnect with the former self who, by the age of 15, had already realized: she would consciously live a childless life. Because she wants to put an end to the genetics that her family has saturated with toxic selfishness, stupidity, physical, mental and sexual abuse across generations. By the age of 15, I knew: I would realistically be able to survive, recover and heal. But I wouldn't have been able to give a small child the security and love that I never received. If that doesn't work, it's better not to have children. Because that's the responsible decision. And it's also better not to pass on this genetics, burdened with horrors to anyone. Which is more than enough for me to work on for the rest of my life. This is my solution, answer and decision.
At least this way, the irresponsible yet child-desiring, toxically patriarchal, often openly or covertly misogynistic men of Hungarian society couldn’t tie me down, keep me in poverty, or limit my career ambitions.