We are searching for documents related to István Dúdor’s life for a film about the artist

The film Icarus depicts the brief yet turbulent life of one of the legendary figures of the 1970s and 1980s Czechoslovakian art scene, the visual artist István Dúdor. It explores how the painter became a victim of the system, his environment, and his own mind.

István Dúdor (1949, Držkovce – 1987, Tornaľa) is one of the least understandable and decipherable figures in Hungarian visual art in Slovakia, yet he is considered among the most talented. He studied privately with Béla Bacskai and Gyula Szabó. He was admitted to the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague without a high school diploma and graduated in 1979 as a student of the master František Jiroudek. After his murder in 1987, his legacy gradually became reduced to anecdotes. The film, beyond the rediscovery of the life’s work of this troubled, eccentric artist, initiates a dialogue between generations about the difficulties of the era, the conflicting struggle between art and power, through the memories of still-living contemporaries and archival documents.

The project was developed as part of the Dunajská Streda-based Story Lab film masterclass and the Primanima Jumpstart screenplay development workshop in Budapest.

Documentation of István Dúdor’s life and work is incomplete, so every photograph, video, story, and personal memory is crucial for the making of the film and a later monograph. If you have any information about István Dúdor, knew him personally, or know of any artwork associated with the artist, please contact us at the following email address or phone number: info@kontur-art.com, +42 1917 162 773.