Tamas Zanko, Pop

Opening Thursday december 12th.

Tamas Zanko was born in Budapest in 1931 and lived in Hungary until 1956.

A freedom fighter, aspiring visual artist and passionate music lover, he became Otto Klemperer's assistant at the Budapest Opera. After the events of October 1956, in which he played an active part, he was forced to emigrate. He arrived in Paris in 1957, where he lived until his death in 2009, two years after his studio burned down. On arriving in Paris, he enrolled at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in painting, then at the Ecole des Arts Décoratifs in theater. He was soon commissioned to create sets and costumes.

He returned to painting in the 60s. He produced canvases in the spirit of the times: lyrical abstraction, then pop art, presented at the Paris Biennials in 1963 and 1965. He also exhibited with Ben Vautier's group, Jean Le Gac and Christian Boltanski. In 1969, they were invited to the group exhibition Work in Progress at the Centre Culturel Américain in Paris. Zanko put on a performance by digging a grave in which he buried a secret box containing his brushes, thus demonstrating the death of easel painting. The work entitled La Tombe - on view in the exhibition - is based on photographs taken by Boltanski during this event.

1953-56 Decorative Arts in Budapest, theater section. 1957-59 Ecole des Beaux-arts, Paris. 1959-60 Ecole des Arts décoratifs, Paris