BEING SÁNDOR TAR 

Hajnal Németh, „Being Sándor Tar”, 2022, casting performance as closing event of the exhibition „Simultaneous City”, Collegium Hungaricum Berlin, 2022
Performed by BerlinVokal
Photo by Hajnal Szolga

Performance as closing event of the solo exhibition “Simultaneous City” by Hajnal Németh at Collegium Hungaricum Berlin in 2022.

Performed by BerlinVokal.

The piece performed is a public casting in the form of a screen test, which although staged and choreographed, allows free space for individual improvisation. Németh’s work is actually a Sándor Tar casting, i.e. the personification of the writer by several candidates, regardless of age and gender.

The public casting is based on the reading of the poem “Blonde City” (1969) by Sándor Tar, more specifically on excerpts from the poem, or a rhythmic, sung performance of featured verses. The casting process itself is in fact purposeless, or rather self-serving, as there is no specific play or film that would subsequently be realised, nor anyone actually selected. By the time of the performance, however, all the candidates have become Tar Sándor, in other words, they identify with the persona of the writer.

Hungarian writer Sándor Tar worked in Dresden as a guest labourer between 1967 and 1970, and then as an instructor at a workers’ hostel in the same city between 1975 and 1976. Drawing on his experiences of living conditions at the workers’ hostel, he wrote his sociographical essay “Prospectus” in Dresden, last published by the Déri Museum in 2017. The same volume also includes the poem “Blonde City”, a 22-page work originally written in 1969 – a personal portrait of society and history, reflecting the world from the depths of the psyche in the light of love for a German woman.

Hajnal Németh, „Being Sándor Tar”, 2022, casting performance as closing event of the exhibition „Simultaneous City”, Collegium Hungaricum Berlin, 2022
Performed by BerlinVokal
Photos by Hajnal Szolga

Hajnal Németh, „Being Sándor Tar”, 2022
Casting performance, approx 20 min
Language: English
Based on the poem “Blonde City” by Sándor Tar (1969, Dresden).
Performed by BerlinVokal
Collegium Hungaricum Berlin, 2022

Realised with the support of:
MODEM, Centre for Modern and Contemporary Arts, Debrecen