Béla Kádár

(Hungarian, 1877–1955)

Béla Kádár was a Hungarian painter and one of the most famous members of the early 20th-century Hungarian avant-garde. He notably employed aesthetics from a range of movements, such as Constructivism, Cubism, and German Expressionism, and focused on traditional Hungarian folklore to inspire his imagery. Whether depicting scenes of abstracted figures, objects, landscapes, or interiors, his work features bright, jewel-toned palettes and a fractured approach to rendering space. Born on April 7, 1877 in Budapest, Hungary to a working-class Jewish family, Kádár was forced to work from a young age after his father’s death. He initially assisted a mural painting company before visiting Berlin and Paris, where he came under the influence of the avant-garde art of the time. He befriended the fellow Hungarian painter Hugo Scheiber and settled for a time in Berlin to further exhibit his work. Today, Kádár’s works are in the collection of the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest. The artist died on December 31, 1956 in Budapest, Hungary.