The Abandoned (1999)

Oláh Mara (Omara) was born in Monoro in 1945. She had a hard life, finishing primary school as an adult. She worked as a cleaner. In the summer of 1992, she was invited by the Gypsy Methodist Centre to the Gypsy Artists' Camp in Balatonalmádi. At the end of 1993, she turned a room in her own apartment into an exhibition space, thus creating the first private Gypsy gallery. The opening of the exhibition was a great success. Since then she has exhibited regularly, her works have been shown in group exhibitions abroad (Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy, USA, Sweden, Austria, the Netherlands) and several times in thematic exhibitions at the Balázs János Gallery. Her works were shown in 2004 in the exhibition Silenced Holocaust at the Kunsthalle and in 2006 in the exhibition Common Space at the Ernst Museum. Called naïve and self-taught, her paintings have been analysed by art historians and she is now considered one of the most important Roma painters. Her works are also in the collection of the Ludwig Museum in Budapest.

'I felt a curiosity and a desire to see if I could paint the pain. First I "painted" feelings, thoughts, and only later - when I got my confidence - faces, gypsy customs, gypsy stories - about cops, whores, hospital. I realised that my first attempt is always the good one, I can't consciously create the same thing. I am a spontaneous painter. My job is to dare to be talented,' Omara said in 1995. Her painting subjects are usually representations of the problems and situations around her. The Abandoned is in line with this: the composition of the painting, reminiscent of the early modern Dutch group painting genre, lines up portraits of women abandoned by their husbands in glowing colours and painful realism. For Omara, painting is a concrete therapy, painting her pain, her dreams and her fantasy world in her works.