Csaba Nemes in MOCAK

In his distinctive art practice, Hungarian artist Csaba Nemes critically investigates sites of social and economic imbalances, the unexpected overlaps between personal and political history, and instances of friendship in times of despair. The exhibition When Politics Enters Daily Life at MOCAK presents Nemes’s singular artistic achievement that deftly branches into painting, drawing, film, animation and photography.

His most recent series of paintings, Frozen Assets (2015), updates Diego Rivera’s infamous 1930s socially-engaged mural of depression-era New York for today’s global political deviations and inflexible social structures. On the other hand, theorist Franco Berardi Bifo’s insight that in the current situation of little hope, caused by financial violence, austerity and new European selfishness, ‘only friendship is left’ provides another pertinent angle on Nemes’s practice. Switching his role from that of a flaneur of transition to an activist for artistic freedom and social justice, the artist’s approach delivers a vibrant chronicle of the transformations in Hungarian society on the rocky road from decayed state socialism to self‑declared illiberal democracy.

Csaba Nemes was born in 1966; he lives and works in Budapest. He graduated from The Hungarian University of Fine Arts in 1989, where he also gained his doctorate  in 2010. He is a lecturer at the Art Academy of the University of Pécs and is represented by Knoll Galleries Vienna & Budapest.