magyar

B u d a p e s t, 28 September 1982

R E P O R T
(about the Galántai’s trips abroad)
(excerpt)

Galántai, but especially Júlia Klaniczay, felt that the most successful part of their travels was the trip in Italy. They went to Milan, small towns around Genoa and probably to several towns in Central Italy.

One of the most important events of the trip was visiting Gian Carlo Politi, an Italian artist. Thanks to this visit, Galántai’s collection, called Art Pool, was almost doubled. Politi is the editor of a fine art magazine, so he – the editor’s office – receives complimentary copies of books, catalogues, periodicals and other documents in vast quantities. Artists and publishers usually send him these in the hope that his magazine would write a review about them and thus they will be advertised. However, from time to time, Politi selects what he wants and does not want to keep and he was doing this when Galántai arrived. Hundreds of books Politi decided to get rid of were given to him for Art Pool. Galántai acquired a vast amount of documents and books during the rest of his travels too, mostly given to him as gifts.

He wanted to ‘sneak in’ these materials on his way back by using a small border crossing – not named here – during peak time. The border guards still examined the documents packed in numerous big cardboard boxes but after a long explanation Júlia Klaniczay assured them that none of the materials were political, obscene or pornographic. During this conversation, Galántai also stated before the border guards that he and his wife are “not involved in politics”. Upon their return he had to completely rearrange the archives. He built a new partition wall out of wood, to which he affixed shelves and stands. The storing system of the documents was also changed, and the paper boxes, marked in alphabetical order, resemble an institutional archives.

Galántai’s collection already contained a vast number of rarities: books and publications not available in any Hungarian public library. This is even more the case now: after the Italian trip Galántai’s private library and archives became perhaps the richest archives of fine art, especially contemporary art, in all of Hungary. In addition, Galántai brought back dozens (!) of cassettes, some of which have pop music and jazz, and many contain interviews and conversations with Western artists, as well as recordings of the actions of Kántor (Cantsin), and others.

A part of Galántai’s new plans are of course focussed on his growing archives. He wants to launch a periodical, which he would distribute mainly among foreign artists.

Tibor Horváth, 1st lieutenant

Registry number: 4/5-950.
Printed in 4 copies

Galántai • Artpool