MUSEUM INTERIOR & EXHIBITION DESIGN

János Kmetty – An unceasing search

Kmetty János – Az örök kereső

Permanent Exhibition of the Kmetty Museum in Szentendre, Hungary | 2018-2021
Curator: Emőke Bodonyi

In 2018 the permanent exhibition dedicated to the art of János Kmetty was renewed, along with the building that houses it on Szentendre’s main square.

This has been the first major renovation since the museum was founded in 1981, and the oeuvre is now presented in a high-quality exhibition facility that befits a European institution. Works in the holdings of the Ferenczy Museum Centre are complemented with masterpieces borrowed from Hungarian public and private collections, and the periodic refurbishment of the exhibition will always allow us to present the most recent research findings.

A key painter of Hungarian modernism, the early career of János Kmetty (1889–1975) admitted the influence of Nagybánya’s neo-Impressionists, The Eight, and French Cubism. He later joined the activist movement, and during the interwar period, he was a member of the New Society of Fine Artists (KUT), a progressive group. Like most of his contemporaries, he visited Paris, and worked in Kecskemét, Nagybánya and Szentendre. In 1946 he was elected into the Society of Szentendre Painters, became a member of the artist colony, and the town provided his art with an essential theme and frame for the rest of his life.