Born in Hungary, originally a professional musician, a conductor and university lecturer in Aural Training, Choral Music and Music Education, Piroska has never thought she would draw, paint, do lino cuts and prints and engage in all sorts of visual arts activities in her free time. It is all thanks to having MS, which totally changed her life six years ago. However, Visual Arts entered her life in an unexpected way and partnered with music. The two create a beautiful unity. Many times weekends give her the perfect opportunity to turn on the ABC Classic FM Radio to listen to Classical Music and paint. Two of her life-long passions, that make her very happy.
Piroska has travelled the world widely with music . After moving to Australia for a lecturing position at the ANU in 1994, she was fortunate enough to explore Australia both through her profession and with friends. Frequent weekend bush walkings with a group of chorister friends, many great trips like crossing the Nullarbor, visiting Tasmania yearly to conduct at festivals, exploring Central Australia and seeing the Uluru, Kata Tjuta and King's Canyon, the heart of this spiritual land that captured her heart and helped her feel at home. Piroska very much loves the remote and isolated areas of this land, interested in the special flora and fauna that nowhere else can be found in the world. Although she lives in Melbourne, her heart is in those remote areas. She fell in love with native plants and her garden reflects this. Native plants and birds have become the source of lot of joy.
Piroska went through rigorous education to become a professional musician and lived a very busy and structured life as a lecturer/performer. She decided not to engage in formal arts education to learn to draw and paint but to take the self-taught, exploratory approach as a visual artist. She started to draw just before Christmas in 2019. Her first drawing was a rather pathetic scribble but she had fun and it relaxed her. Somewhere she read that it takes at least seven years to become an artist. It took twenty to become a professional musician so she has plenty of time to learn and experiment.
To keep an archive, Piroska regularly posts her works to entertain her friends on Facebook and Instagram. For her greatest surprise, many of them followed her example and started to draw, paint and post their creations. As a music teacher, probably this fills her mostly with pride. Especially, during Coronavirus times, it was truly heart-warming to see her friends' and ex-students' art works. Her creations have become inspiration to others because they saw how much fun she was having while gradually improving.
Many of her ex-students, ex-colleagues and friends started to enquire if they could buy her works and that was the start of it. Just last weekend Piroska made nine new works that she posted on Facebook and by Sunday afternoon six were booked which is an incredible feeling. To know that her works go to people whom she knows, had a special connection with and who will appreciate her artwork is incredible. Piroska likes to know that her works make people happy. It's important to her. Many times she even mails works to friends who go through tough times. The response when they get the parcel with the painting is worth everything! Perhaps that is the purpose of making art. To make ourselves and others happy and leave something behind.
Another thought.... Piroska finds that there is perfection in imperfection. The Japanese "wabi-sabi" embraces the idea of ageing, flaws, and the beauty of the effects of time and imperfections. Frequently, her artworks that are far from being perfect, still has so much beauty and joy in them that she does not mind, even finds it extremely attractive with all its imperfections. Her works feature gold and occasionally, silver paint as her signature colour.
Piroska practices Kintsugi, the Japanese tradition of golden joinery in a special way.
She frequently highlights or "fixes" things using gold paint, just like the Japanese fix broken things with gold to give them new life. Everything is precious.