Lot number 139 - Gejza ANGYAL (1888-1956)

Painting - Gejza Angyal (1888 Kremnica, Slovakia - 1956)

'Portrait of a Girl with a Sunflower,' signed and dated 1941, oil on canvas, image dimensions approx. 113 x 81 cm, provenance: private collection, Regensburg, see exhibition Gejza Angyal – Restored Paintings 2024/2025, in cooperation with the Central Slovak Gallery, the National Bank of Slovakia – the Mint and Medal Museum in Kremnica, and the Slovak National Gallery – Zvolen Castle: He completed his art studies in Budapest and during a subsequent stay in Munich. He was an active member of the cultural scene, exhibiting in local and international art centers, winning prizes, establishing contacts within the art world, and becoming a member of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He also regularly undertook study trips to Italy, France, and Scandinavia. His artistic development was firmly rooted in realism, but he gradually succumbed to contemporary influences such as Luminism (the so-called Central European variant of Impressionism). His early graphic works showed an even more naturalistic tendency, and at the height of his career, a more modern expression and a more analytical approach to landscape painting prevailed. He created large-format genre paintings in which he monumentalized characteristic figure types against the impressive backdrop of his homeland. Another thematic focus in the painter's already mature oeuvre, which connects to local working life, addresses global issues and significant historical events such as the economic crisis and the threat of the Second World War, interweaving them. Scenes of hard-working, and later even desperate, women and mothers emerge against the backdrop of the horrors of war. The theme of bombing concludes Angyal's distinctive collection of monumental paintings with a social message. In them, he addresses almost essential civilizational themes, from religion, labor, and the environment to the contrast between motherhood and destructive war.
[BRPFKWN5F9]