When I was a student in the University of Fine Arts in Budapest, there was an open call for students. They wanted to find the best painter to paint all the rectors of another University, in Hungary (ELTE). I didn’t apply, but it gave me the idea to create a painting of the employees of the Secretariat of our own University. They were / are these invisible, but key figures. When I approached them with the idea they suggested me to search for more aesthetic topics to paint. They were afraid that such an image would ridicule them. They didn’t think of themselves as „worthy to be portraited” in an oil painting.
I insisted and finally made the painting. And it turned out that they appreciated it a lot, so it is still hanging in their office today.
To create images of everyday people, without beautyfing or without ridiculing them was and still is a challenge for me…
