Labour and Art: The Dualism of Backwardness and Timeliness in Hungary and in Its Eastern Neighbourhood

The period between 1867 and 1918 is labelled in Hungarian history as the Era of Dualism. Besides the dual national sovereignty under the single Habsburg ruler, the Austro-Hungarian dualist monarchy shows other dualisms worth looking into in the context of labour struggles and painting art. The dualism of the backwardness of the nation and the remarkable progress of arts is to be mentioned first. In the agrarian country, just coming to (still limited) independence—the “pantry of Austria”—with the semi-feudal society in the background, Hungarian painting art was independent, linked to Western Europe, joining and being part of the most advanced trends of Western painting. There was no capable working class in Hungary, subservient peasantry provided labour. Progressing from early jovial, folkloristic images, searching new paths of impressionism (L.Deák-Ébner), evolved into a portrayal of the miserable poverty of rural workers with bitterly critical realism (A.Fényes, J.Vaszary). Factory workers appear on the canvas at the end of the nineteenth century (K.Kernstock) when labour movement becomes noticeable. The historical overview leads to the conclusion that changes in artistic styles are not independent of historical events and shifts. An example: the advance of the avant-garde during the 1919 revolution. The division between Eastern and Western Europe must be mentioned as a decisive duality, resulting in identifiable similarities of the East-European countries affecting both labour and arts as well as their joint representation (I.E.Repin, O.Băncilă). After the formal division of Europe to two zones by the 1947 Paris Peace Accords, the Soviet Zone dictatorships—labelled as “workers’ state”—abolished any independent workers’ action and subordinated artistic portrayal to praise and glorification of the regime, called “socialist realism”, making a mockery of earlier forms of realism.