Category Archives: magyarcsaladblog

The main Unger playing-card workshops // Az Unger kártya főműhelyek

The continued research of the past year has yielded new results and it has now been possible to locate the exact places where the two main playing-card workshops of Mátyás Unger the Elder and Younger were located in Győr: one in Apáca utca, formerly #323, now #27, next to the German Hospital and Church. Altogether, though, the old house no longer exists as it was torn down with its two neighbouring houses to the left and right when the German Hospital built a new building adjacent to its original edifice in the latter half of the 19th century. It is now an old folks’ home, according to Dr. Gyula Vadász. This house belonged to the Ungers from the 1810s to the early 1840s, when they had to have it auctioned off and moved to Bástya utca #260, now Duna kapu tér #7. This brown house was newly erected in 1850, and the Ungers therefore took residence in the Apatur ház on Széchenyi tér at around this time, but kept their playing-card workshop there until c 1857, when they ceased their playing-card production in Győr.

Standard 56-card deck

Standard 56-card deck (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Despite the fact that the original house in Apáca utca is obsolete now, we have been able to make considerable progress with the reconstruction, ie outside-in analysis of the artisanal playing-card production in 19th century in Győr. To be continued… and photographs will also be added to this post soon.

Unsolved family mysteries I — What happened to Géza Unger?

One of the hitherto unsolved mysteries in our family’s history is the fate of Géza (Viktor) Unger. Géza was my great-grandmother Ancs’ uncle, her father’s youngest brother born in Győr in 1860. Accoding to family lore, he deserted the army and emigrated to Nis, Serbia where he married a jeweller’s widow. Why exactly he deserted is unknown to us and it is surprising because his two older brothers Alajos and József (Pepi) both served in the army and his uncle, painter and draughtsman Alajos Unger, had served in the National Guard for a while. What backs this story are both an entrance in the town council minutes in his hometown from 1880, where it says that he was persecuted for an offence related to his military service in Budapest. Additionally there is a photograph by the Serbian photographer Milos Kostic in the possession of my family, which depicts what is probably a somewhat older Géza with a woman, most likely his wife. She might have been pregnant. Milos Kostic worked in Belgrade, but whether or not he also worked in Nis I have been unable to find out so far. Other than the photograph and the information passed down orally to us, we know nothing about how he fared, how long he lived, whether he did have offspring. The search is ongoing. Photos to follow in an update

Jumping on the bandwagon

Due to my heavy workload and a stint abroad, I have not been able to post as much here as I would have liked to. The work and research on the Ungers is still ongoing though, at the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte in Munich and elsewhere. I shall soon post something on the etymology of Unger as promised, but I need to consult a few books at the Bavarian State Library. Maybe it is because I am an academic, but I would rather properly quote the sources my explanations are based on.

I am also looking into cutting tools to prepare and finally make available some footage on the playing-card making process. I do not know yet how long this will take, I am a novice to video production. There is so much more to report on and material to present, but I will need to take it one step at a time.

The interesting news though is that there now are people who claim to be my relatives. For once, I received an email message from the museum that three families would like to get in touch with me because they are my relatives. I do have various relatives in Hungary and elsewhere I know of and unfortunately we lost touch with the Hungarian and some Austrian ones entirely when the older generation died in the 1990s. However, I stumbled across a German newspaper article from Neue Zeitung in Budapest, which discusses the recent museum exhibition and then portrays two Unger women from Sopron who claim to be relatives. From what they write I do not think so, but I would love to find out. I wrote to the paper to enquire…

And I saw that someone else too of the name Unger, who definitely is not a direct relative, also tries to create the impression that there is a direct link between him and my family. It must be so cool to be a descendent of a card-making and artist family… I am now beginning to fully grasp the former relevance of the Gotha!

But of course it is easy to fall for a red herring or get sidetracked, it happened to my family too. At the beginning we were still clueless about the original whereabouts of the Ungers since Mátyás Unger senior had not been born in Győr, nor had he been married there. Someone had provided my father with a copious pedigree from Ungers inhabiting a nearby village called Jánossomorja. I shall never in my life forget the incredulous look on the supposed relatives faces when we – my parents, a cousin and her father then in his 80s and I – showed up there one afternoon in the Easter holidays of 1988 to enquire about a possible connection… It is impossible to describe their puzzled reaction (as if it mattered!), but just thinking about it now for the first time in years I am almost rolling on the floor laughing, literally.

The Unger exhibition opening at the museum

At the long last I manage to post here again. I had prepared two further entries, but have not managed to proofread them and add pictures as of yet.

In the meantime I have returned from a holiday in Hungary, where I tried to relax as much as possible, spending as much time as possible riding, soaking in thermal baths and just seizing the moment.  The first days were nice and warm, but then the weather changed and it became hideously cold, definitely not what we had expected.

Last Thursday then the Unger exhibition (Egy győri polgárcsalád a reformkorból: az Ungerek – Kártyagyártók és művészek/ A middling sort family from Reform Age Győr: The Ungers — Card producers and artists) was opened at the XJ Museum in Győr. I cannot say how thrilled I am about this. Not just because it is so exciting to see the wooden playing card stamps from my family and pictures of their cards on display there, but also because finally Alajos Unger’s art is appreciated posthumously. This I had hoped for for the longest time and to find as much of his original artwork as possible. I remember when I was sitting on a bench in the parco Ducale in Parma contemplating this when I spent three months there attending Italian language and art history classes at the university there as an Erasmus student. I was taking every opportunity while being there and travelling around the country to see as much (renaissance) artwork as possible in museums, churches and elsewhere, which is really funny because Parma and Duchess Marie-Louise played such an important role in Leopold Kupelwieser’s career. This especially since I did not know that Kupelwieser had been Alajos’ teacher back then… Anyway, something somehow drove me to the arts back then, which helps me understand and appreciate Alajos’ art so much better.

Anyway, the exhibition was organised by the museum and it is not only highly informative but also has a high aesthetic value overall I find. This not just because of the artwork on display there — basically the two oil paintings from the National Gallery (The Recapture of  Győr, the family portrait from 1843) and the Madonna my relative loaned as well as various drawings by Alajos and Kupelwieser. I am also very pleased that the museum used all my information on the family and its members, which my family (my parents and the relative who loaned the painting) and I had researched and compiled for so many years. Finally it has all been bearing fruit and all these findings will be presented in more detail in my forthcoming article in the museum yearbook Arrabona. Dr Gy Sz mainly gave a summary of this article in his opening speech. It is noteworthy that the museum has shown such an interest in the history of the Unger family.

Alajos Unger’s Mary with Jesus and John (oil on canvas)

Alajos Unger’s “Mary with Jesus and John”, oil on canvas, ca 70×90 cm, date unknown, family ownership

The oil painting has been in the possession of the descendents of the Unger family and it has never been on display in an exhibition yet. On 31 May 2010 it was transported from Lower Austria to Győr by Dr C Wunderlich, where it was taken to the János Xántus Museum by Gy P, director of the museums of Győr-Sopron-Moson County and Z Sz, curator of the upcoming exhibition on the Unger family. It is currently being restored. The photograph shows the painting in the museum director’s room at the museum on Széchenyi Square in Győr on that same day.

The picture features Mother Mary with Jesus and little John the Baptist with Joseph and Zachary in the background.

(Upon request of the painting’s owner, the photograph has been removed for the time being.)

Unger Alajos/Alajos Unger (Győr 1814 – Győr 1848)

The (re-)discovery of a Kupelwieser-pupil and his works: Alajos Unger (bap 29 Oct 1814 +28 Dec 1848); also called Alois, Aloys or Lajos Unger

Vita brevis, ars longa. Hippocrates

Alajos Unger was born as the third child of master card-maker Mátyás Unger and his wife Anna Brandelmayer, who had settled down in Győr after getting married in their native town of Sopron in January 1811.

He started his education at the elementary and drawing school in his native city, where his drawing teacher was the painter János Hofbauer. In 1833 he began attending the drawing school at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts, before he became a pupil of Leopold Kupelwieser in 1836, where he stayed until 1842. There he also studied anatomy under Anton Schaller.

In 1846 he displayed a painting at the exhibition of the Art Association of Pest.

He travelled around Europe. In 1848, after his return to his hometown, offered art courses in Győr’s local newspaper Hazánk and furthermore joined the national guard in the revolution and freedom fights (for some time) in that year.

For unknown reasons, he died of hepatitis in December 1848 and was buried by Ferenc Ebenhöch, a later cannon, local historian and collector of various objects that are now featured in museums in Budapest and Győr.

Alajos Unger’s known works are drawings (particularly male nudes), portraits, historical and religious depictions, the latter being the main theme of his oil paintings.

The whereabouts of most of Unger’s works are unknown, with the exception of two oil paintings in the possession of the National Gallery in Budapest, a collection of 35 drawings owned by the X J Museum in Győr and private collectors as well as further oil paintings owned by private owners. Several of these works will be shown at an exhibition at the museum to be opened in September 2010.

Worklist:

The recapture of Győr, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest, at the time of publishing this entry on display at the Festetics palace museum  in Keszthely

The artist and his family, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest

Mary with Jesus and John, family ownership

35 drawings, mainly male nudes, JX Museum, Győr and private ownership

Judith and Holofernes

The baptism of King Stephen, private ownership

St László, king of Hungary, perceives King Solomon (Szent László magyar király ráismer Salamon király)

The Holy Family

Picture clock with view of Venice, family ownership

to be continued

Literature:

Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon online/Artists of the World online, s.v. Unger Alajos

Wunderlich, C (2009): “Die Győrer Spielkartenmalerfamilie Unger – Im Spiegel neuer Erkenntnisse“, in: Talon – Zeitschrift des österreichisch-ungarischen Spielkartenvereins, 18/2009, Vienna/Budapest,  pp 78-81

Wunderlich, C (in preparation): “The Unger artist and card-making family of Győr, ” (working title) in: Arrabona, yearbook of the János Xántus Museum, Győr and the literature cited therein