Gabor Szilasi
Gabor Szilasi | |
---|---|
Born | Budapest, Hungary | February 3, 1928
Known for | Photography |
Spouse(s) | Doreen Lindsay (b. 1934) |
Gabor Szilasi (1928) is a Canadian artist known for the humanist vision of his social-documentary photography.[1][2]
Career[]
Born in Budapest, Hungary in 1928, Gabor Szilasi first became interested in photography while in medical school in 1948.[3] Largely self-taught, Gabor Szilasi started to photograph in Hungary in 1952 when he purchased his first camera, a Zorkij. In 1956, he documented the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 in Budapest and shortly afterwards fled the country.[1] He emigrated to Canada in 1957, settling in Montreal.[2][4] From 1959 to 1971, he was photographer at the Office du film du Québec. Sam Tata introduced him to the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson and encouraged his social-documentary photography. In 1966, he was introduced to the work of the American documentary tradition as practiced by Paul Strand and Walker Evans while studying at the Thomas More Institute.[1] He was photography teacher at the Collège du Vieux Montreal (1970-1980) and associate professor (1980-1995) and then adjunct professor at Concordia University.[5] The work he made of communities such as Charlevoix, PQ (1970), Montreal`s art community (1960-1980), or was commissioned to make in Italy, Hungary and Poland (1986, 1987, 1990)[5] or of Hungary to which he returned in 1980, 1994 and 1995[1] aimed at the modernist photography ideal of precision, luminosity and permanence which increased the beauty and historic value of his prints.[6] He used the camera to take views of urban environments, individual portraits or gallery openings.
After 20 years of photographing in black-and-white, around the mid-70s, Szilasi began to use colour to describe certain cultural and social characteristics.[7] He began photographing interiors, mostly living spaces, in colour and later combined colour with black-and-white to convey portraits and interiors. Around 1982, he began photographing electric signs.[7]
Selected Exhibitions[]
In 1997, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts organized a travelling retrospective of his work titled Gabor Szilasi: Photographs 1954-1996.[5] Monet's Garden was shown at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in 1999.[8] In 2017, Montreal's McCord Museum exhibited a 20-year selection of his unpublished photographs of the art world in Montreal, titled The Art World in Montreal, 1960-1980.[9][4][10]
Awards[]
- Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts, 2010[5]
- Paul-Émile-Borduas prize for visual arts, 2010[3]
- Knight’s Cross of the Order of Merit of Hungary Award, 2018[11]
- Companion of the arts and letters of Quebec[12]
Collections[]
His work is included in the collections of the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec,[2] the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal,[13] the National Gallery of Canada[1] and many other collections. He is represented by the Stephen Bulger Gallery in Toronto.
Personal life[]
Szilasi is married to the photographer Doreen Lindsay.[14]
References[]
- ^ Jump up to: a b c d e "Gabor Szilasi". www.gallery.ca.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c "Szilasi, Gabor". Collections | MNBAQ.
- ^ Jump up to: a b "Gabor Szilasi photo exhibit in Montreal – RCI | English".
- ^ Jump up to: a b "A new McCord Museum publication on photography: Gabor Szilasi". The Suburban Newspaper.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c d "Gabor Szilasi | the Canadian Encyclopedia".
- ^ Langford, Martha (2010). "A Short History of Photography, 1900-2000". The Visual Arts in Canada: the Twentieth Century. Foss, Brian, Paikowsky, Sandra, Whitelaw, Anne (eds.). Don Mills, Ont.: Oxford University Press. p. 287. ISBN 978-0-19-542125-5.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Murray 1987, p. 166.
- ^ "Gabor Szilasi". art-history.concordia.ca. Concordia University, Montreal. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
- ^ "Gabor Szilasi: The Art World in Montreal, 1960–1980 – McCord Museum". Musee McCord.
- ^ "Les vernissages selon Gabor Szilasi". La Presse. November 14, 2019.
- ^ "Awards for Canadians". canadagazette.gc.ca. Government of Canada. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
- ^ "Gabor Szilasi". www.calq.gouv.qc.ca. Counsel of Arts and Letters of Quebec. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
- ^ "Gabor Szilasi, Andor Pasztor, Montréal, 1977, printed of 1979". MAC Montréal.
- ^ Harris, David; Szilasi, Gabor; Arts, Montreal Museum of Fine; Montréal, Musée des beaux-arts de; Populi (Firm), Vox (May 18, 1997). Gabor Szilasi. McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. ISBN 9780773517288 – via Google Books.
Bibliography[]
- Murray, Joan (1987). The Best Contemporary Canadian Art. Edmonton, Alberta: Hurtig. Retrieved 2021-06-14.
- Living people
- 1934 births
- 20th-century Canadian photographers
- 21st-century Canadian photographers
- Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts winners
- Hungarian emigrants to Canada