The Rhythm of the Masses – Rediscovering a Forgotten Body of Work: The oeuvre of Mária Kósa (Molnár), a distinctive voice in Hungarian art between the two world wars, raises questions about community, spirituality, and the nature of human relationships that remain surprisingly relevant even a century later. The exhibition at the BTM Kiscelli Museum – Budapest City Gallery presents an oeuvre reconstructed from fragments and attempts to restore the artist to the history of 20th-century Hungarian art.
“The fundamental idea of my art is to evoke emotion in the masses,” wrote Mária Kósa (Molnár), who focused in her works on the rhythm of forms, the power of the overall effect, and the emotional charge of her compositions. Her art is defined both by the emotional intensity of Expressionism and the Symbolist approach that seeks deeper layers of meaning.
What makes this exhibition unique is that newly discovered pieces from the previously scattered estate are now on display together for the first time. Alongside the weathered plaster miniatures, woodcuts, and linocuts preserved in the collection of the Budapest Art Gallery, newly discovered prints and documents, as well as sculptures on loan from private collections, trace her brief yet multifaceted creative career.
Biblical themes, human relationships, and questions of spirituality are common in the works of Mária Kósa (Molnár). In addition to sculptures, she also created graphic series organized into cycles, which depicted biblical scenes, personal motifs, and humorous animal tales. Her versatility is evidenced by the fact that she wrote librettos for two works by her husband, composer György Kósa, and that a study of hers on composition has also survived.
The exhibition also evokes the artist’s creative milieu. In the cultural life of the interwar period, music, Passion and mystery plays, the art of movement, as well as religious and spiritual pursuits all played an inspiring role. This intellectual environment likely played a defining role in the art of Mária Kósa (Molnár), in which themes of community, faith, and human relationships feature prominently.
The artist’s career was cut short by the tragic twists of history. As a result of the political changes, social tensions, and anti-Semitism of the interwar period, as well as the post-1948 realignments in art policy, her body of work was pushed into the background, and many of her works were lost or destroyed. New research now makes it possible for the first time to bring the surviving works together and to reveal the previously hidden connections in her artistic career.
The exhibition The Rhythm of the Masses aims to demonstrate the enduring relevance of Mária Kósa (Molnár)’s art even from the perspective of nearly a century, and to restore her to the historical narrative from which she was excluded due to her tragic death and subsequent shifts in cultural policy.