The Hungarian government has declared a commemorative year in honor of the 200th anniversary of the birth of poet Sándor Petőfi, and the National Institute for Strategic Research has organized the traveling exhibition "I am Hungarian – Petőfi 200" for this occasion. At the institute's request, 70 contemporary Hungarian visual artists have expressed their thoughts in visual form. "Their works offer a comprehensive image of the poet, the revolutionary, the national hero, and his era, as well as the artists' relationship with their nationality through the spectrum of feelings and thoughts," say the curators.
Among the exhibiting artists—emphasizing those from the diaspora community—are many established artists, renowned contemporary artists, and young talents. "Perhaps the most unique pieces in the exhibition are the three works by Marcell Jankovics, the animated film *János Vitéz,* as well as the original sketches of the animated figures. Among the artists, we also find Kolozsi Tibor, a sculptor from Cluj, recipient of the Munkácsy Award, and president of the Miklós Barabás Guild," they add.
"When Petőfi was born, the Kingdom of Hungary was part of the Habsburg Empire, with its national independence compromised, the dominant power in Central Europe. But it was precisely then, in the first half of the 19th century, that a new spirit began to take hold across Europe, inspired by Enlightenment ideas and the French Revolution. Economic and social reforms began: it was the era of bourgeois transformations and national awakenings, whose aspirations were encapsulated by contemporaries in the motto *homeland and progress.*
In this environment, the young rebel poet emerged in Hungary, who, with his voice, new themes, and atmospheric power, undermined conventions, mediocrity, and salon lyres. In his 26 years of life, he wrote nearly 1,000 poems. As a poet of Hungarian language and identity, he still has an unprecedented impact on world literature: he has been translated into the major and minor languages of Europe; many of his translators learned Hungarian for the sake of his poetry. His work contributed to the awakening of the national consciousness of smaller European nations that fought for their freedom.
Victor Hugo referred to him, and later Nietzsche composed music to his poems. He played an important role in creating an image of Hungarians that persists to this day. He became a central figure in the events in Hungary that were part of the European revolutionary wave: he served his homeland as a poet in the 1848 revolution, which carried the banner of civil liberties and national self-determination, and as a honvéd officer in the struggle for the defense of revolutionary ideals.
Revolutionary, national hero, myth: through his poetry, dynamism, and heroic death, Sándor Petőfi became the authentic embodiment of Romanticism."