The Studio House in Vence, Built in 1984, as a Collaboration between Bálint Nagy, László Rajk, and Gábor Bachman

Text: Júlia Őry

One of the most unique works of Hungarian architecture of the 1980s was built forty years ago in Vence, in the southern part of France. This house deserves attention because of its location, its client and creators, the character of the work, as well as the way it was built. The careers of these architects, who started their profession in the 1970s and were already producing mature works in the 1980s, are now coming to an end. The intersection of the oeuvres of Bálint Nagy and László Rajk – in addition to their decades-long friendship, their activities within the democratic opposition, and their significant public engagement – is a few joint architectural works from that decade, the study of which has never been more timely than it is now. This 64 square metre house is also an unusual work of its own time. It stood in its original form for only a few years as in 1991 it was purchased by Fred Nell Hollis, a protégé of the American artist Salvador Dalí, who radically rebuilt it so as to suit the purposes of his association, the N.A.L.L. Art Association. Therefore, today we can only reconstruct the house based on some surviving drawings and photographs. As a patron of fine arts, Mihályné Károlyi commissioned young architects who had been forced out of Hungary to travel to France and build a studio house. In 1949, Mihály Károlyi and his wife purchased a three-acre site in Vence, some twenty kilometres from Nice, on a hillside covered with olive trees and cypresses, overlooking the sea. Károlyi himself died here in 1955. In 1959, Károlyi’s wife established the Mihály Károlyi Foundation and its international artists’ colony. Over the years, several small studios and residential buildings were built on the estate, with participating countries supporting their own artists in this way.