public conversation
What was the art scene like in 1980s in Hungary, when serious conceptual art gave over its place to light, new painting? How did the official and the second publicity relate to each other? Have the artists’ activities foreshadowed the political transition of 1989?
The preceding event was a conversation between László Beke and Georg Schöllhammer in March 2008 in the framework of the Free School for Art Theory and Practice.Then Beke and Schöllhammer were talking about the international contacts of the Hungarian art scene in the 1960s and 1970s, the reception of international trends in Hungary, and the art events organized in apartments and semi official institutions.
László Beke was one of the most significant art historians and exhibition organizers of the Hungarian progressive art from the late 60s. Beke was employed in the Art History Documentation Center, the predecessor of the Institute of the History of Art in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, which he is currently directing, before he worked in the Hungarian National Gallery, and between 1995 and 2000 he was the director of Kunsthalle Budapest.
Georg Schöllhammer, as an expert of Central European conceptual art has organized numerous projects and is constantly working on integrating the art of the region into the international context. Schöllhammer is a free lance curator and critic. Earlier he was the critic of Der Standard, and since 1995 he is the editor in chief of the journal springerin – Hefte für Gegenwartskunst. Georg Schöllhammer is project leader of tranzit.at, and the editor of Documenta 12 Magazines.