Najmányi, László: New Mexican Study – Simon and Peter (1988)

Fine artist, theatre-, video- and filmmaker, writer, composer, journalist – Laszlo Najmanyi is a multi talented artist. He is one of the pioneers of the Hungarian conceptualism, fluxus, independent theatre and video art. After forming Spions, the Soviet block’s first punk band with his friends, at the end of the 1970’s he was forced to leave Hungary by the dictature’s authorities. He lived in 12 countries of 4 continents since, until he’s found his home in New York City. An avid minimalist, he is fond of directness and immediacy. Many of his works are in American, Canadian, French, German and Hungarian private collections. At the end of the 1980’s he was commissioned by James Lyman Nash, an American art collector to create an altarpiece, an installation and a series of paintings, based on his own interpretations of the Gospels. The works were strongly influenced by American indian art, Apache, Zuni and Navajo petroglyphs, cave-paintings and sand-paintings, which the artist studied while he was living in New Mexico. There are two pieces from these studies in the Museum’s collection. Simon & Peter is a conceptual work, painted with natural pigments from the desert. The artist takes Christian symbolism one step further on this piece: if Jesus is the Shephard, his followers are the Sheep, obviously the Apostles must play the role of guarding and herding Sheep-dogs.