Correspondence of János Tornyai. 1-2

The painter János Tornyai, who died eighty years ago, was an outstanding master of the Great Plain school. Ferenc Kőszegfalvi, a retired local historian from Hódmezővásárhely, collected 936 known and unknown Tornyai letters written by him and to him from public collections, periodicals, and private individuals. János Tornyai, the man who created the work, is characterized more directly by his various written works than by his paintings and drawings, and his individuality and habitus are best reflected in his letters. His stubborn, uncompromising being and individuality can truly be recognized from his correspondence; in these individual, original writings, the initiated artist and ordinary person who unwaveringly followed his own path is revealed sincerely and deeply. From the simplest peasant to the greatest artists, he could speak to everyone in his own language. His recipients came from the widest circle, he addressed a wide variety of people, from master tailors to state secretaries. His letters provide a glimpse into the soul of their writer, but they also reveal his wide-ranging connections. They reveal his self-destructive, uncompromising passion for art, the tragedies and contradictions of his life. This collection is also a kind of portrait of the times. Hungarian life at the turn of the century and in the first third of the 20th century, the rural market town and Budapest, emerge in these letters.