Czóbel, Béla

Béla Czóbel, Hungarian form Czóbel Béla, (born Sept. 4, 1883, Budapest, Hung.—died Jan. 30, 1976, Budapest), painter and graphic artist, one of the most highly regarded figures in 20th-century Hungarian arts.

Czóbel was a student of Béla Iványi Grünwald at the Free School of Painting in Nagybánya (now Baia Mare, Rom.), and from 1902 to 1903 he studied in Munich and at the Académie Julian in Paris. At the Salon d’Automne he exhibited his work with Fauvist artists, and his 1905 painting Kislány ágy előtt (“Little Girl in Front of a Bed”) was influenced by Fauvism. In 1911 he became a member of the Nyolcak (“The Eight”), an influential Modernist group in Budapest. From 1914 he lived in the Netherlands and later in Berlin. His unique cityscapes, interiors, and portraits, which had an oppressive ambience reminiscent of the German Expressionist school, were exhibited in Berlin and then in Budapest. In 1925 he moved to Paris, where he remained for 15 years and where he produced most of his mature works, some of which include Gyümölcscsendélet (“Still Life with Fruits”) and Ülő akt (“Sitting Nude”), both completed in 1929, as well as Múzsa (“A Muse”), from 1930. In 1929 he held a one-man exhibition in New York City.

After World War II he worked in Paris in the winter and in Szentendre, a picturesque Hungarian town, in the summer. He was awarded the Kossuth Prize in 1948. Among the important paintings he produced in his later years are Csendélet chiantis üveggel (1953; “Still Life with Bottle of Chianti”) and Rózsaszín ruhás lány (1958; “Girl in a Pink Dress”).