Here, Anywhere
2009-2012

The map of Hungary is speckled with capsules of time. During the political transformation twenty years ago, as the country experienced change it simply forgot about certain places – streets, blocks of flats, vacant sites and whole districts became self-defined enclosures, where today a certain outdated, awkward, longed-to-be-forgotten Eastern Europeanness still lingers. There are places which seem to be at one with other parts of the city in a single space, but their co-existence in time is only apparent; places which decompose in accordance with their own specific chronology, determined by their past, such that what remains would then either be silently reconquered by nature or enveloped by the lifestyles of tomorrow’s generations. Of the inhabitants, who have never fully integrated with majority society, soon only traces will remain, until they, too, disappear in the course of time.

Having experienced the influence of Soviet power, felt directly in everyday life until the political changes as a child, and having comprehended and interpreted its intellectual and social after-effects as an adult, I decided to record the hidden realities which are essential in order to understand the country as it hovers on the borderline between the eastern and western worlds. I do not observe these mini-universes with the aim of mapping entirety, but rather wish to condense certain arbitrarily chosen details into embodiments of an obsolete existence. The photographic series begun in 2009 examines the typically transitional period and the symbolic characters and locations of post-communist space. The pictures record the historical manifestations of a country which, having shaken off the constraints of foreign powers many times, has successively demonstrated that it is quite incapable of arranging its own power relations and social structure in a manner complying with common European values. It is a country where in recent times the entanglement of competing political interests has resulted in the disappearance of the belief that power can be exercised in a modern, democratic way.

Budapest, 2012




Crows (near Debrecen, East Hungary), 2009



Night Watchman (Budapest), 2009



Bricks (Budapest), 2009



Bus Stop (North-East Hungary), 2011



Deer (North Hungary), 2011



Abandoned Factory Site (near Székesfehervár, West-Hungary), 2011



Gage Tree (South Hungary), 2011



Roma Ghetto (Budapest), 2010



Sunflowers (Balatonakarattya, West Hungary), 2010



Building (Emöd, North-East Hungary), 2009



Peter with a Mangalitsa Piglet (North-East Hungary), 2009



Car Wreck (Budapest), 2009



Spoil Heap (near Salgotarjan, North-Hungary), 2012



Soviet Military Painting (Kiskunlacháza), 2012



Abandoned Room (Soviet Base, Szentkirályszabadja, West Hungary), 2012



Lieutenant Colonel Istvan (Jósvafö, North-East Hungary), 2011



Abandoned Soviet Base (Szentkirályszabadja, West Hungary), 2012



Equestrian Statue (Pákozd, North Hungary), 2011



Locust Trees (North-East Hungary), 2011



Tree and House (West Hungary), 2011



Petya (near Budapest), 2011



Ruin (near Budapest), 2011




installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011



installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011



installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011



installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011



installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011



installation view: Here, Anywhere, Robert Koch Gallery, San Francisco, 2011