Art historian Gergely Barki on paradigm shift and the international context
MúzeumCafé 27.
Gergely Barki remembers who inspired him most in his childhood. At grammar school he was interested in a great variety of subjects – he flirted with archaeology but finally art history became his favourite and he took the entrance examination for Budapest’s Eötvös Loránd University. At that time he was attracted to the Renaissance period, particularly to the Trecento, but he also attended lectures by Professor Krisztina Passuth who persuaded him to write his theses about Róbert Berény. “The encouragement she gave was all I needed to focus on Berény,” he remembers. Not only can he thank Krisztina Passuth for Berény but also for involvement with a group of young art historians who later did their PhDs under her. Péter Molnos, Attila Rum, Zoltán Rockenbauer, József Sárkány and Gergely Barki researched the same period with great determination. Compared to their predecessors they shared a new approach in relation to how they saw and wanted others to see art history. At that time these young researchers already had their own special fields, artists they wanted to focus on, yet the group led by Passuth had opportunities which defined the direction of their research over the following years. “Passuth could see the potential in us and thought that if we combined our forces great things could come about. And indeed, we were soon thinking about working together and organising an exhibition.” In 2002 it was still a desire and a distant plan, but eventually the exhibition Hungarian Fauves was held in 2006 at the Hungarian National Gallery. It proved to be highly successful, not only in Hungary but also in France. Another exhibition in Pécs, The Eight, directly followed the theme. Asked whether he sees any similarity between The Eight and themselves. “The Eight shifted the paradigm – they wanted something new and different.”