Art Market Budapest 2018 Review – In Search of Undiscovered Talents of Eastern Europe

This famed couple—a librarian and postal worker, art collectors who helped put Pop Art on the map— didn’t have a child. Yet, if there are collectors cut in their cloth who want to discover the yet undiscovered art talents of our time—and especially those in the relatively-unknown-to-Americans Eastern European artistic centers in Slovenia, Hungary etc.— Art Market Budapest would be a good pit stop to add to a global art scouting itinerary. This October show now in its 8^th year boasts being the largest contemporary art exhibit in Hungary, that includes thousands of art works from 100 worldwide exhibitors.

The pleasant surrounds of Millenáris Park, where on an unseasonably warm October weekend couples came to flirt and families came to lounge, play and exercise, extends before Art Market Budapest like a soothing green welcome mat. The setting seems to announce “This is accessible art”. Chicagoans will be reminded of the pinch-me thrill of walking in and out of free world-class art exhibits in the Chicago Cultural Center or New Yorkers similarly of exhibits in its famed older Public Library building.

Unlike crowded days at Art Basel Miami or Art Basel Hong Kong, the throng size never felt out of control – helping you lap up the art at your own pace. You see young – and well-behaved—children here with their parents. You see mothers with strollers.

He was there more to be seen, than to see. It truly was hard to miss him and as he was sitting in a car adorned with a Mao on top in the Propaganda exhibit booth. Sosnowski quipped, “I’m here to save on parking costs..”

As newbies to the scene it was easy to remark instead at both the déjà vu of seeing certain galleries that you see at the very mega-Art Basel show the aforementioned a-space artists collective derides. For example, the controversial photo portraits of indigenous peoples by Jimmy Nelson were on display, along with a pitchman to buy the virtual reality book to get them all. Big name galleries from Berlin, London, Tel Aviv and the like were there too—many featuring Hungarian artists that perhaps one could also see worldwide but somehow stood out more in situ. As you walk the halls you too may think that the preponderance of Slovenian artists’ works that seem for the relative population in that country suggesting a per capita cultural focus on art worth an exploration.

Mostly though, there was not a Central/Eastern European aesthetic that seemed in any way unique or different, with the possibly exception of a rightfully expanded showcase of photography that not only was especially intriguing but also a propos in a land that brought the world Robert Capa, László Moholy-Nagy, and André Kertész. Somehow segregating the photographic works from others helped one, at least this non-photographer writer who adores the medium nonetheless, get into a better photography viewing head.