World-wide famous Munkácsy paintings can be seen in Szeged's Móra Ferenc Museum this month. You can admire 41 renowned paintings, many of them haven't been exhibited in Hungary yet. Actors of the Szeged Theatre revive Munkácsy's life, you can visit the shows in July. In the great hall of the Museum you can see the 36 m2 big painting of Munkácsy, the Golgotha.
Munkácsy Mihály can be proclaimed Hungary's greatest and most well-known painter. He lived in Paris and earned international reputation with his amazing genre and biblical paintings. He was born to German parents in the Kingdom of Hungary, in Munkács, the town of which he later named himself. He was quite influenced by the modern French art seen at the Universal Exposition in 1867.
In the early years of his career Munkácsy painted mainly scenes from the daily lives of peasants and poor people. In 1869, Munkácsy painted his much acclaimed work The Last Day of a Condemned Man. This is considered his first masterpiece. The picture was rewarded with the Gold Medal of the Paris Salon in 1870. Towards the end of his career he painted two monumental works: "Hungarian Conquest" for the House of Parliament and a fresco entitled "Apotheosis of Renaissance", for the ceiling of Kunsthistoriches Museum in Vienna. By the 1890s, his depression grew into a severe mental illness which was probably intensified by the syphilis he caught in his youth. His last pictures are troubled and sometimes even bizarre. Nineteenth century visual art or the historical developments of Hungarian art cannot be discussed without considering Munkácsy's lifework.
The 36 m2 painting is "Hungarian Conquest", not "Golgotha"
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