Judit Reigl

Hungarian, 1923-2020

Biography
Judit Reigl was born in 1923 in Kapuvár, Hungary. After the death of her father from a heart condition developed during World War I, Reigl and her mother moved to Budapest. She was admitted to the Budapest Academy of Fine Arts at the age of eighteen and spent time traveling through Italy in 1947-48. In Hungry, Reigl completed several government commissions but was unwilling to conform to the rigid standards of the socialist realist society. As a result, Reigl escaped Hungary in 1950 after eight failed attempts.

Reigl settled down in Paris and soon became acquainted with André Breton. Her initial works included surrealist imagery but her oeuvre later progressed to include photo collage and more abstract works. She began to use industrial materials to paint but Reigl saw her body as the primary instrument in the creation process, similar to the American Abstract Expressionists. Her work discusses movement, bodily elements, and the central theme of music. In her later works, Reigl focuses on corporeality, working with both sides of the canvas to emphasize the three-dimensionality of the paintings.

Reigl has exhibited her works several times in Paris as well as other parts of Europe and America. Her paintings can be found in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim, the Museum of Modern art among other places. At age 93, Reigl is still painting in her attic-studio in Maracoussis, France.

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