Ákos Ezer

And The Homo Inflexus

- Sasha Bogojev

When exploring the human form, that most consistently tantalizing and engrossing subject, modern painters often seek approaches developed by twentieth-century portraitists like Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud. Akos Ezer shares their same interest with his own unique method, embracing the human figure in a highly relatable way, presenting our own clumsy, insecure entanglements with ourselves and others.

When we discovered the work of the Hungarian painter almost three years ago, we became instant fans of his pink-loving palette of vibrant colors, buoyed by a confident and unmediated painterly technique. Using thick layers of ardently applied oils, the Budapest-based artist builds complex, multi-figure scenes, as well as simple portraits of his protagonists as they negotiate life’s vagaries. Blending the compositions of comics frames, along with the atmosphere of “fail” videos, all wrapped in a traditional expressive painting format or sculpted in ceramic, he continues to document the degeneration of Homo Erectus towards what we might call Homo Inflexus.

Sasha Bogojev: At which point did the figure become a central point of your work, and do you remember how that happened?