2009
video
26'
Homage to my grandparents, about their studios, and personal objects.

The text in the video:

This video is homage to my grandparents, Béla Czene and Erzsébet Hikádi. They were both painters, born in 1911 and
they lived 67 years together in this house.
My grandfather died in 1999, his studio was not used for 10 years. We have moved some part of the furniture, but the
insides of his cupboards, his paintings and personal things remained untouched. My grandmother died in the May of
2008. We had to empty her flat almost immediately, because someone else was to move in. We have put her clothes into
sacks, her things into boxes.
In 2009 me, and my boyfriend have moved in my grandfathers apartment and studio. Before the renovation we had to
face that unbelievable number of personal and professional objects, writings, drawings, notes, which these two
people gathered together. The subjectivity and the movements of the camera, the silent noises refer to this first
hand experience and the intimacy of this work process.
While making an order in the unbelievable amount of objects found in the studio, it was my fundamental experience to
get to know these people through the records of the story of their lives, the way I never knew them alive. While
I’ve got to know more and more personal details of their lives, I’ve learned about my personal and artistic roots as
well. I recognised myself in what I’ve inherited from them, and I’ve recognised them in myself.

Czene Márta