Palkó Tibor: Édes tér

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An exhibition restored from the original WordPress archive of Godot Gallery.

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The Godot Galéria cordially invites you and your partner.

Palkó Tibor

Édes Square

for the exhibition titled ___

Opening: 2008 April 2 at 20 o'clock

Opening: L. Simon László, writer

Viewable until May 2

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Details from L. Simon László's writing:

The real artist does not paint the fruit itself, but its fragrance. For the real artist, the scent of paint is the aroma of the fruit; to him the brush is a trowel, a saw, a half‑kept old carving tool. Paint itself is also the sealant, and the canvas is the earth, the heavenly humus. The artist steps cautiously into the garden of Eden, where he then, in a daft mood, takes a sip from the air, saying: My God, what a scent!

We spread out the harvest. Beside it, a sack: where we poured it, where we packed it. A neighbourhood sack or Sámlis’ sack? It matters not: a picture within a picture or a picture next to a picture, parallel readings of the same story. Perhaps there is nothing more delightful than the apples or peaches of a child's orchard, or my grandfather's fragrant fruit. Their beauty had already been called into question, stains and wounds writhing upon fragrant bodies; the city folk, used to polishing, sizing and individually packaging produce, would comfortably set aside the fruit laid on the sack. This is what we ate, the leaf‑streaked remnants.

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The masters, if required, even bestowed their produce. Their fragrant daughters, their pleasantly scented sons, their sweet fruits. The offering is a donation, a gesture of love. The offering is a service, for some – a transaction made in the hope of redemption. Sometimes an earnest gesture, a reward, joy, a gift for the one who offers. The offering is bread and wine. It is life itself. A festival beyond death.

In the Csallóköz there is a small village, Szentantal, also called Bácsfa, where Archbishop‑Primate Lippay György began construction of the church and monastery belonging to the Franciscans of the Order of the Virgin Mary 1660. Here hangs a special crucifix, on which the Blessed Virgin weeps blood. The painting’s own origin is itself a miraculous tale. At the village of Doborgaz, neighbouring Szentantal, in 1703, a peasant lad named Liszkay Márton attempted to go into the field in his wooden wagon, but, ill‑fatedly, tried stepping onto it, fell and was struck by the makeshift apparatus of the vehicle. He suffered such severe internal damage that he had to lie down for half a year. In summer he was carried into the garden, helplessly lying beneath fragrant fruit and flowers, or simply sleeping in the shade of a vine trellis. Because he could not move his limbs, nearby children often patted him; one of them held a thick magnifying glass that had fallen from a pair of spectacles above his palm, burning his skin. The lad knew that doctors could not heal his condition, so he turned to the Blessed Virgin for help. He vowed to paint a picture if he recovered. After the pledge his condition miraculously improved and he soon rose to his feet. Liszkay Márton painted the Blessed Virgin’s vow picture with a painter from Pozsony, and with the permission of the monastery guard it was finally hung on the wall behind the Principal’s back. The monks grew accustomed to it, loved it, and at one point began to say their daily psalm before it. The lay brothers decorated the picture with flowers; local devout people also cherished it, and whenever they visited the Principal they would touch and kiss it. In 1715 the crucifix shows first water pouring from the eyes of the Virgin Mary, then blood. Petal tears and blood tears. They collected the tears of wailing blood in a small handkerchief, keeping this relic to this day. On the farewell day they unveil it before the public on the Principal’s altar.

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Karel Capek writes in his book The Passionate Gardener that “the true gardener does not tend the plant, but tends the soil, the earth. He buries himself in the ground… While immersed in the earth he lives. He builds a monument to himself in the composting. When entering the garden of Eden he would whimsically sip one from the air, saying: My God, this is indeed the humus!”

Opening hours: from Tuesday to Friday 10 to 18, on Saturday between 10 and 13 hours.

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