The Golden Age of American Rock Posters in Budapest
Until the 31st of December, the Kogart Gallery in Budapest exhibits ‘From San Francisco to Woodstock – the Golden Age of American Posters 1965-1971′. The Kogart Gallery remembers the music festival which marked an era and a way of resistance towards the society of consumption in the 20th century, through posters which shaped the psychedelic art trend, concentrating in the products of the area of the San Francisco Bay.
The posters mark, in a majestic way, a time of great social transformations which shaped art, music and politics, and generated a unique aesthetic in all the social fields. In those years, San Francisco, California, was an effervescent place full of activities which changed the everyday life of the city and its surroundings with the Beatnik and Hippy culture, as well as with more radical movements such as the Black Panthers who fought for civil rights and social change.
The graphic work which these exhibited posters show not only have the historical interest of remembering a time and the Woodstock Festival, but in them they have the signs of a new visual art current, which are linked to Central European traditions. The exhibition also contains other items of that time, such as original documents of the manuscripts which were made for these projects, sketches and the tools used for their making.
The Woodstock Festival, whose complete name was ‘Woodstock. 3 days of Peace & Music’, was the music and art rock festival which shined the light the most on the hippy movement and their ideals of pacific co-existence and rejecting the Vietnam War, where thousands of people died every day. This took place on a farm in Bethel, in Sullivan County, close to New York, on the 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th of August 1969. The initial project was to carry it out in the town of Woodstock, Ulster County, New York, but the local conservative population opposed the idea of the festival taking place where men and women of ‘dubious reputation’ would attend, who would sleep together and as a group. From there it got its initial name but, in the end, Sam Yasgur convinced his father Max Yagsur to facilitate the lands of his property.
The festival, full of passivity, only had three deaths, but none of them product of violence, and it gave birth to two children full of the spirit of love and peace.
On its great stage, they sung against the war and in favour of the revolution, they paid tribute to Latin America, the burned American flags in disgust due to their imperialist politics, and the most important rock icons of all time shone, such as Joe Cocker with his t-shirt which shaped fashion, Jimi Hendrix, who made the most impressive guitar solo ever playing the American anthem and imitating war sounds with his strumming, and Joan Baez with her songs of social protest, amongst over a hundred artists.
The documentary on ‘Woodstock. 3 Days of Peace & Music’, directed by Michael Wadleigh and edited and produced among others by Martin Scorsese, reached the cinema screens around the world in 1970, causing a real furore among the young population. For this documentary, the director obtained the Oscar for ‘Best Documentary’.
For more information: http://kogart.hu/kogart/en/index.jsp
Nancy Guzman
This exhibition is a great way to remember the golden age of the 60s, so rent apartments in Budapest and relive those times where the dream for world peace seemed to be within reach.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Christmas Market in Budapest
Christmas is a time that whether we like it or not, whether we’re Christians, Muslims, Jews or atheists, it always connects us with our childhood and that unstoppable pleasure of giving others a small gift or something which brings them happiness, even if it’s a short one, but that feels affection further than itself. Maybe from there there’s emerges the tradition of Christmas markets, and Budapest has the most beautiful and entertaining one in the whole of Eastern Europe.
Known as the Christmas market of Vörösmarty Square, it begins every year close to the 20th of November, for those who go shopping early and don’t leave everything until the last minute. The closing date is the 29th of December, because there’s always someone who left buying presents until late and waits until the new year to give them. Its opening hours are from 10am until 8pm except on the 24th, because that day, for those who have forgotten it’s Christmas Eve, all 100 stands in the market are open until 2am in case anyone had forgotten to buy gifts.
In any case, it’s always beautiful, whether you go to buy gifts or not, to walk around this market which offers never ending objects for the delight of the ones with weak will to buy. Such is its fame that ‘s become a classic spot for tourists, especially because of the singular aesthetics of this place, which is amplified with the pretty wooden stands styled like small chalets. Here they exhibit the most typical Hungarian crafts, curiosities, some interesting antiques, local artist’s works and all sorts of objects, which I assure you you won’t find anywhere else.
However, not everything that you find here are objects, there are also the food stalls of typical food at unique prices, with dishes that would delight gourmets. If you still haven’t tried ‘Lángos’, bread cooked with a potato dough, I recommend it, because here you’ll find the most delicious and traditional ones in Budapest. There are also the wonderful apple strudel made in traditional Hungarian ovens. And to beat the cold, nothing better than a ‘forrait’, a warm punch made with wine, cinnamon and herbs which is served in a cup which you can take with you a souvenir of Budapest and its Christmas Market.
Also, there are musicians and cultural activities every day with different presentations. So don’t think that if you went one day you saw it all, the opposite, there will always be new surprises to enjoy, so you can walk, see, eat and, of course, shop. Everywhere you can find stimulants that will make this visit a very special one.
For those who travel with their family, this is the ideal place to visit as a group, because apart from everything that we’ve explained for the adults, there are special entertainment programmes for the children, so nobody will get bored in this market.
Nancy Guzman
In order not to miss this wonderful panorama, rent apartments in Budapest and have fun walking and buying at the Christmas Market at Vörösmarty Square . After, with your shopping finished, you can go to the thermal baths to relax and carry on enjoying this charming and enigmatic city.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Retrock: Experimental boutique in Budapest
When it comes to creating in fashion, the best thing to do is to be irreverent and uncontrollable. Urban fashion is in constant change, just like cities, and one has to dress to rise to the occasion. The challenge is in knowing what to choose confidently among the best designs and models for each situation, each event, each day. Today, the role of fashion in culture is still expanding, for good or for bad, and it constitutes itself even more into an indispensable factor to understand youth, the political circumstances of politics and towards which direction common interests are going. The main thing is not to lose your mind when choosing a design, by trying to impress or being casual.
The visual production of today surpasses the limits of assimilation of all Internet users. In other words, a large part of the world is connected to a marasmus of images and stimulants which surpass our capacity of interpretation. From this distinctive feature of our present, fashion uses resources such as design, photography, recycling and politics to be able to denounce or praise its own market. The biggest companies in fashion of today don’t waste time on their studies on market campaigns because now it’s clear that fashion is on the street and it follows the street, for the street. Never doubt in finding a new garment or style by walking around where you usually do. You just have to have a little more curiosity and risk, finding new designs, vintage clothes or accessories in any city which you go to. It’s not about being original, as you know, but more about knowing how to organize those accessories and clothes which go best with your personal style.
Like in all European cities, even more now in this globalized era, Budapest also generates new fashion and clothing trends. As it’s well known, fashion in Budapest is part of its daily life, just as it is to always present new models on the international catwalk. Budapest is among the cities which the fall of the Berlin wall suited best. Certainly a city which offers a lot of culture, history and art, as well as first class night entertainment. All of this fits perfectly with a perspective of global growth, in which those cities which were isolated before due to old ideological systems, now flourish trying to be in the centre of the international cultural production.
Retrock presents some of the most interesting designers in Budapest, among which we can find Nanushka, Use Unused, Tamara Banuff and Je suis belle. At Retrock you can find unique pieces, all of them original samples of the newest in international trends. Also, of course, there’s international designer clothes, and fashion created from recycled elements, new materials or vintage, as well as comic books, posters of the 60s and 70s and the best kitch accessories that you can imagine. All of this in an atmosphere in the centre of Budapest, with the best service from a young stuff filled with great energy. For more information of Retrick, visit its official webpage clicking here: http://www.retrock.com/
Alexa Ray
Nothing better than getting apartments in Budapest and being part of emerging fashion in this beautiful city.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Rihanna in Budapest
Maybe it’s because in terms of sparkling and outright stardom only one or two names can come close to Rihanna – who will be performing at the Sports Arena in Budapest on the upcoming 8th of December (http://en.budapestarena.hu/html/) – her concerts are always an event which are able to raise interest, attention, passion and even obsession with a capital O in an extraordinarily diverse crowd, which can be illustrated by the fact that even CocoRosie, someone who would position themselves as the polar opposite to Rihanna in terms of music, have declared being a big fans of her.
According to the musical producer Evan Rogers, during a visit to Barbados in 2003 when he agreed to carry out an audition to the Caribbean singer, who was not yet 18 years old, he had the feeling that the rest of the girls at the audition disappeared completely, as if the presence of Rihanna when entering the hotel where the audition was taking place had the power to make it impossible to see anyone else. Anyone who has seen Rihanna won’t find it hard to believe.
Together with her fascinating capacity to change her appearance continuously without giving up taking risks (however she says herself that Madonna is her biggest influence and has declared her aim to become the ‘black Madonna’), it’s probably the aforementioned and unforgettable energy charge in her presence, which combines sexuality close to the surface of an unsettling and even terrible exhuberance (all the numinous power of a goddess of sex) with features of delicate and unquestionable beauty where you can see triumph, exposing for the umpteenth time the ethic purisms, the truth of goodness and aesthetic privileges of the mixes (her mother is Afro-Guyanese and her father Barbadian from Irish descent), on top of her, on the other hand, undisputed gifts as a singer, managing to seductively mix contemporary R&B, dance-hall, hip-hop, reggae and Caribbean music, which is the true key to her success.
Such an overwhelming success has taken her, in barely six years, among other things, to reach the sixth position in the Google list of most searched people, having her own wax statue at Madame Tussaud’s, managing worldwide sales of over 30 million albums and over 100 million singles, as well as being the first woman who has managed five number 1s in five consecutive years in the UK charts, where, partly due to the controversy raised by her vibrant song ‘S&M’, along with its even more controverted and powerful video, it smashed all the sales records (more than ten million sales) with her album ‘Loud’ (2010).
Paul Oilzum
Perhaps for this reason, under the numinous power of her unique presence, her concerts are, at least until now, more of a frantic succession of spectacular scenes that someone has compared with the action of randomly zapping through different pop video channels, than some kind of concept idea, which is something to be grateful for in present times. If you rent apartments in Budapest you shouldn’t miss it.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Wamp in Budapest
To talk about design in today’s day and age is to be aware of what is really going on in the field of aesthetic exploration and production and marketing means. All of it is linked with one another: don’t expect that the new t-shirt that you’ve bought in the kitschiest shop in your city has nothing to do with any new conceptual agenda or relation with the newest in political complaints or new ways of production which are environment-friendly. Many designers, today go for ‘green’ trends, an option which as well as helping the planet with its immediate corrosion and destruction, works as an even more seductive factor for the product you’re about to consume; and it’s more than obvious, don’t let them fool you: behind any attempt of ‘political correctness’ there’s also a catch to get more money out of you so that others make more money.
The ease that design production is made with these days, thanks in the same way to quicker and more efficient means of production, makes that many young people can show their work and that there’s a larger variety of new possibilities. Despite that quantity doesn’t mean quality, what’s true is that among more range of choice regarding fashion, accessories, objects, music or home decoration, there are better options of finding the right gift or fetish. In other words, as well as being a very good option so that thousands of creative people gather, Wamp is also one of the best places to find the most unusual and special Christmas gift, which will surely delight the person receiving the gift, because they will have a unique stylish item, and especially because it will be the latest in Budapest’s world of design.
And so, Wamp is more than a market, it’s a designers exhibition, a space of action, an emerging community of new talents in Budapest. Wamp presents itself once or twice a month during the year. This way, the best in design is available for citizens, tourists, curious people and everyone who is passing by or lives in the beautiful city of Budapest. This way, Wamp is the perfect meeting place for creative people from around the world, as well as the trend setters who search for the cutting edge in European fashion.
Wamp presents the best in graphic arts, photography, painting, sculpture, ceramics, home textiles, fashion, accessories, jewelry, furniture and gastronomy. Some of the names you have to remember when visiting Wamp are, MÍO Design, Gera Noémi, Muka Viktória, Kaintz Regina, Czeizler Zsolt, Földi Klára, Ligeti Miklós, BringaBag, Becker Judit, Csekő Etelka and MUSU among others. For more information on Wamp visit the following webpage: http://www.wamp.hu/
Alexa Ray
Get apartments in Budapest and be part of its vibrant cultural life as well as the unmissable Wamp Market, where you’ll definitely find what you were looking for in new fashion, design and accessories. Highly recommended for artists, designers, art critics and, of course, trend setters.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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Contemporary Drama Festival Budapest
Theater had a realistic slope for many years. It was not until the late nineteenth century when it started to appear a change in this trend, mainly due to the various artistic vanguards and the advent of modernity. So, thanks to advances in visual media through symbolism and abstraction, theater took a step to higher levels of representation, staging and proposals. Today, contemporary drama uses a variety of new resources ranging from video, installation and increasingly minimal and conceptual staging, in which new records interact with aesthetic, political, current and controversial stories.
Perhaps the greatest example of total contemporary theater is the King Ubu by Alfred Jarry, a piece with multiple variations and recurring themes, works both the in stage and the subject matter from a political irony and humor truly amazing for its time. Jarry was a visionary, and as such, a precursor of Dadaism and other “isms” of the time. The curious thing about a piece like King Ubu, is that besides its high sarcasm, questioning the political environment of its time, anarchic and volatile capacity, is structured from the meaning and quite complex language games, in which the reader or anyone who witnesses the piece, simply get carried away by logic staged games. In this work, too, shedding is minimal nature of the staging of contemporary art.
Antonin Artaud took a step forward in creating theater. With his theories on the “Theatre of Cruelty,” Artaud not only proposes new means even more abstract and metaphysical included in the staging. It was after his explorations in Mexico with peyote in the Tarahumara tribes Theatre Artaud understood as a profound exploration of the unconscious, which also reveals a ritualistic nature scene on the set. So Artaud makes plays in their colors appear as substances, or occurrences that increased the volume on stage. What encourages Artaud is not stable look over the world, but rather quite the contrary. Artaud reveals the short depth of human spirit and the horror of the void, the inability to be present or be in the unrecognized breath by breath, no more than a pathetic construction of meanings around us, and that reality invention is also empty, no other culture density that gives, and which confuses us, contra lateral and manipulated.
The Contemporary Drama Festival Budapest has over ten years. During this period, there have been more than a hundred international performances in the festival, which each year continues to cause interest at the Hungarian public as well as internationally. The festival is a very interesting space in which new proposals for theater and performance converse, mingle, and generate new creations. For more information, visit the following website: http://dramafestival.hu/
Alexa Ray
Get apartments in Budapest and enjoy the best in current drama.
Translated by: Hans
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Bizottság Film Club in Budapest
Until the 13th of December the Műcsarnok Museum exhibits a cycle of the best Hungarian cinema form the 80s. Projections at the museum are held every Tuesday seeking to revive an era where a rupture with the classic look of films -matched to socialist realism- is abandoned even if it is present as a burden of films that emerged from the avant-garde Russian movies where each image is a work of art.
The history of Hungary has been plagued by tragic events, that film has recreated with ability, thus, the historical film legacy is huge. Just taking a look at these films is to understand that Hungarian culture has been forged in adversity, which has not stopped them from having great artists, musicians and a little known rich film collection
Since the seventies, Hungarian movies are divided into two tendencies, one which focuses on formalism and another one that assumes the reality as the object of their stories. In both cases the strength of Russian films based on the perfection of the picture continues to dominate, that is, the look of film as art.
One of the authors included in the list is the director of the film Ecstasy. András Kovács ,a film director and writer who directed about 30 films between 1961 and 1996. He was a guest and jury at the Cannes Film Festival of 1976. Kovács takes the theory of great Russian cinema, by looking through the existential conflicts of the individual and observing the conflicts of the world around him.
Another of the great directors whose films are in this cycle is János Xantus, with his 1988 film Rocktérítő. Xantus has been enshrined in the international cinema circuit with his film Mephisto in 1981, which won an Oscar, 8 prizes, plus a nomination. The story is set in the early 30 ‘in Germany, where an actor, who lives without taking into account the political situation focuses only on his art. When the Nazi power grows, he sees the chance to work with propaganda for the Reich. He soon becomes the most popular German actor, but he sees his friends disappear and does nothing about it, opting to only satisfy his ego.
Filmmaker and journalist Victor Kubiszyn and his 1989 film Árnyékszázad are part of this cylce, drama being one of his favorite themes that speak of personal conflicts facing contradictory worlds where reality and unreality are one-jointed.
In addition to these films you can also see Time by Andras Monroy, Me Babe from 1993, by Peter Reich and The Self Control of Laszlo Fe Lugossy from1988.
For more information
http://www.mucsarnok.hu/new_site/index.php?lang=en&t=597&curmenu=109
Nancy Guzman
The Danube, the wide avenues and bucolic setting is a great incentive to live during this fall in apartments in Budapest and enjoy the hot springs, presentations like this film cycle , in addition to their top quality restaurants.
Translated by: Marc
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Franz Liszt in Budapest
Until the 31st of December, the Palace of Arts in Budapest exhibits “The Many Faces of Liszt” as part of celebrations for the 200th anniversary of the birthday of Hungarian musician Franz Liszt. This exhibition makes a journey through his life and travels through photographs and an interactive map designed by the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design Budapest. For this, the National Archive has cooperated by providing photographs and archival materials for the exhibition.
Franz Liszt was born in Raiding, on October 22, 1811, while that territory was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He began studying piano with his father and continued in Vienna, where he was the disciple of the pianist, Karl Czerny and studied composition with the Italian Antonio Salieri. In 1823 he moved with his family to Paris, a place that allowed him to begin his career as a musician and concert pianist. Taking advantage of his stay in in Paris, he followed lessons in composition with Ferdinando Paër, famous in his time by composing operas in Italian. He also took classes with the theorist and composer Anton Reicha.
His virtuosity in music, especially on the piano, took him to be one of the most important concert performers of Europe during the nineteenth century. It was said that his mastery over the piano and the quality of his performances led him to create advanced sounds, drastically changing the classical music and its interpretation.
As a composer he became the most prominent of the New German School and composed varied piano rhapsodies and concerts. His compositions notoriously influenced the twentieth century music.
But Liszt wasn’t only a pianist, composer and director; he also devoted his time to teach more than four hundred students. As a composer, he created nearly 350 works, wrote and collaborated on eight volumes of text, not including his correspondence with musicians and artists of his time. He made nearly 200 paraphrases and transcriptions of other piano composers.
Liszt was one of the most innovative musicians of the nineteenth century, being demonstrated in the creation of complex nuanced chords that surprised critics of his time, because of his break with musical traditions. For this, he explored new musical paths with his technique of thematic variations. We can appreciate them in the Sonata in B minor, 1853, as the simple beginning notes that are being transformed to give the work a strength tone. This technique influenced dramatically in the work of Wagner and Strauss. His compositions for piano required a difficult technique, which gave the instrument a completely new sound.
All these qualities of his work, made Liszt to be one of the most famous musicians of his time and that’s what this exhibition is, a full tribute held in Hungary to one of the most important men in music history.
For more information http://mupa.hu/en/program/the-many-faces-of-liszt-photo-exhibition-2011-10-08_10-00-elocsarnok
Nancy Guzman
Music is always a good stimulator to senses, so if you want to assist to the tribute to one of Hungary’s most important musical artists of the nineteenth century, rent apartments in Budapest and come to the Palace of Arts.
Translated by: Hans
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Rita Ackermann in Budapest
The 18th of November, the Budapest Ludwig Museum opens the exhibition of works by the Hungarian artist Rita Ackermann. The exhibition is curated by Kata Oltai, who has organized it around her latest works which are juxtaposed with some of her early works, within the space given to the Museum of Hungarian artists who have so far been not very well-known.
Rita Ackermann was born in Budapest in 1968. She studied Fine Arts in Hungary. In the late 90′s she moved to New York, where she lives and works today. She started her career as a painter and then evolved to complex visual arts, influenced by trends and discussions on art in the United States and her studies at the School of Art in New York. Her complex works reflect her own transformations and became one of the favorites of the underground of New York at the end of the twentieth century.
Her works, interestingly combine different art languages. Music, image and plastic, which adds a variety of languages and particular expressions, typical of the youth or certain social classes that give her a sense of wholeness and content on the world around New York, as a summary of all cultures.
Her series of drawings and collages with pieces of poetic texts reflect the search for answers from a youth that lost its generous dreams for humanity and is now plunged into drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex, almost like a collective suicide. She is not looking to respond to the existential anxiety with her work. Rather there are only questions, not interpretations or social criticism. Those tasks are left to the viewer, looking respond to and interpret the uncertainties about his/her generation.
Her perspective and story focuses on fertility and pornography. They are diametrically opposed to contrast the procreation and pleasure, in socioculturally terms they are decoupled. Ackermann tries to betray the location of a generation immersed in a society, which is constantly bombarded with messages about pleasure, but when people dare to do what the messages say, thy get punished by the law. This was reflected in her most interesting work Escorpionun, which juxtaposes images and texts.
This is the first stage of work, which opened the way to the stage where Ackermann examines art and the historical process contained and expressed through art, focusing on traditions and concepts of European painting, in contradiction to the U.S. . An interesting look that goes to the debate with the history of art.
Ackermann’s work at the Ludwig is an interesting exhibition to appreciate, this symbolic imaginaries of the Hungarian artist, because all of them are her vision of two worlds, the origin and the arts and everyday life.
For more information http://ludwigmuseum.hu/site.php?inc=kiallitas&kiallitasId=764&menuId=44
Nancy Guzman
The Danube, wide avenues, culture, romance and coffee is what you need for this fall. Just rent apartments in Budapest and come to enjoy the best moments of your life.
Translated by: Hans
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The bridges of Budapest
“She arrived at the bridge and crossed it to the centre, now walking heavily because the snow opposed it and from the Danube there was a wind that grew below, a difficult one, which sticks to you and harasses you.” ‘Lejana’ by Julio Cortázar.
In 1951, the writer Juilo Cortázar published his book of stories ‘Bestiario’, the first story book which the writer felt that really expressed what he wanted to say. One of those stories is ‘Lejana’ (‘Far’). ‘Lejana’ is a fantasy story in which a woman, Alina Reyes, from Buenos Aires, feels the cold, the pain and the angst of a woman who lives in Budapest. She feels her like if it was herself. She feels her double. The story is beautiful and you can find it on the internet. Towards the end, Alina from Buenos Aires and Alina from Budapest meet and hug on one of those bridges which cross the Danube.
I ask myself in which of the bridges which cross the Danube and join Buda and Pest will Cortázar have imagined that hug?
On the Chain Bridge? That’s the oldest and most famous. It was inaugurated for the first time on the 20th of November 1849, after 20 years of construction. During the Second World War it was destroyed. Afterwards, in 1949, it was inaugurated after its reconstruction. Maybe we could consider it the perfect place for the union of a person and her double, with it being a bridge which is actually two: the 1849 one and the 1949 one. Also, the Elizabeth Bridge, which was built in the honour of the Empress Sissi, is two in one, rebuilt after the War. But something discards it: its recent reconstruction was in 1964 and, as we already said, Cortázar’s story was published in 1951.
There are six other bridges to take into account (and to visit when you go to Budapest): The North Rail Bridge, which as well as being a bridge for the railway also can be used by people and bicycles; the Árpád Bridge, inaugurated in 1950, probably in the same year that the Argentinian writer began to plan his story although, thinking about it, a new and modern bridge would not be as attractive and poetic for a story such as ‘Lejana’; the Margaret Bridge, designed by a disciple of the French engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, which we shouldn’t rule out because we know that Cortázar lived and loved Paris.
Out of the three remaining ones, it could also be the Liberty Bridge or the Petőfi Bridge, but the one which definitely wasn’t was the Lágymányos Bridge, which was built in 1995, eleven years after the death of the author of ‘Rayuela’.
vali
When you go to spend a few days in the city, having booked already apartments in Budapest for your stay, take ‘Bestiario’ by Cortázar with you and read ‘Lejana’ on one of its bridges.
Translated by: aleixgwilliam
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