Vilmos Aba-Novák

Vilmos Aba-Novák (Hungarian: Aba-Novák Vilmos, until 1912: Hungarian: Novák Vilmos; March 15, 1894 – September 29, 1941) was a Hungarian painter and graphic artist. He was an original representative of modern art in his country, and specifically of its modern monumental painting. He was also the celebrated author of frescoes and church murals at Szeged and Budapest, and was officially patronized by the Hungarian nobility. As a fresco painter, he completed numerous state and church commissions (for example: the frescoes of the Roman catholic church in Jászszentandrás, the Heroes' Gate in Szeged, the frescoes of the Szent István mausoleum in Székesfehérvár) in 1937 he won the World Exhibition in Paris, in 1940 the XXII. Grand Prize of the Venice Biennale. Seeing his pictures at the Paris exhibition, Pablo Picasso asked: "Who is this barbarian genius?" The virtuoso style of his late paintings incorporated elements of expressionism and the formal language of the Italian Novecento. It is characterized by dynamic compositions painted with loud colors, inspired by monuments; his favorite subject was the world of the village fair and the circus. He used a brilliant technique to evoke the life of the people of the Great Plains - not without caricaturistic elements. His pictures are preserved in the Hungarian National Gallery and other public collections, as well as in many private collections.