FELLOWSHIP-WINNERS OF THE CAPA GRAND PRIZE HUNGARY 2022

In 2010, I started photographing my long-term project titled “The Mud Country”, which aimed to present the families living along the dirt roads of The Great Plain and their everyday lives. I first travelled to Csanytelek, where I met several families and my interest has not ceased since. The village, its inhabitants and their everyday life had a strong impact on me, as well as the generally perceptible transience. It became clear to me that I could present such a world only in a larger series of photography, so I began to scout for further locations worth going to. I was surprised to realise the number of lives affected by the dirt roads, and how unfamiliar city inhabitants can be with what it means to live without concrete. I met a lot of people, and that’s how I practically became a family member of The Borsos Family in Csanytelek, becoming a regular visitor, almost an old friend of many. I was able to present my series through several exhibitions and competitions, but I never really felt it to be complete. I thought a lot about the next possible steps, how I could better summarise the experienced impressions. The ongoing changes of these lands, the continuous feeling of transience, the palpable decrease in population as well as emigration so became the center of my attention. I thus would now like to further address the region through different eyes and a wider range of topics, going beyond the “The Mud Country” series. We live in a transformative age, and photography has been an excellent tool for documenting the rural image, tradition and customs my generation has got to know. I think that “Where the road ends” can make the work of the last years final, going beyond the dirt roads for a complete project on local changes, transience, locality and emotions linked to the locations. Binding its identity, local communities are the force and future of the Hungarian countryside. A sense of belonging keeps the people in place. The rural person has its strength in the knowledge that, no matter the power being elsewhere, the center of the World is where he/she lives. The importance and preservation of tradition and customs characteristic to the various regions is inevitable in the lives of the communities, yet are in serious danger in several places due to the aging population. I have found almost vacant streets and abandoned houses in many parts of the areas I visited. Besides the weakening of local communities, the urbanisation of population has undoubtedly increased, and only seems to be accelerating. One lifetime ago, 30% of the population lived in cities. Today, 55% of the World’s population lives in an urban environment. According to forecasts, four-fifths of Hungarians will live in cities in the upcoming decades. An even bigger problem for Hungary's rural areas is the decline in its population. Based on the above, my photographic plan is to present as much a comprehensive picture of the settlements of the Great Plain as possible, in which I would like to provide pictorial answers to the most important questions: how can communities survive or strengthen again in smaller settlements? How do population ratios change? And, how is the now seemingly continuous emigration to bigger settlements developing? In the future, I would like to reinforce the series with portraits and personal stories of the people living in the places I’ve documented. The support provided within the scope of the award would greatly assist me in being able to delve deeper into this theme, and into the work requiring constant travel. I would be further inspired to continue the series I began earlier, by making it whole in the form of a book. The book would be the final form of presenting my work alongside the opportunity to present the photos at an exhibition as part of the award. I would make the exhibition installation comprehensible and complex for the viewer by combining 3 different image sizes (107x80cm, 93x70cm, 67x50cm) including personal interviews and stories.