Czene, Béla

Biography

Béla Czene was born in 1911 in Isaszeg (city in Pest County). Between 1930 and 1933 he attended at the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts, where Gyula Rudnay was his teacher. He early found the trend of the Roman School in his styles, his Rome stay greatly helped it between 1938-1939, after he had won the scholarship of Collegium Hungaricum of Rome for the proposal of Tibor Gerevich. In his picturesque style he increasingly bound to the Renaissance classical and the Greco-Roman tradition, including the art of Leonardo da Vinci and Domenico Ghirlandaio. After the Second World War the themes of his typical technique painted images he got from the everyday life.

During the artist's life he was awarded several times. In 1937 he won the Youth award of the Hungarian National Fine Arts Society, in 1942 he got Ede Balló award for his “Hunor and Hungarian” titled paintings, in 1943 he was awarded by the Budapest Capital City’s József Ferenc award as well. After the war in 1948 the Prize of the fresco competition of the Ministry of Culture, than in 1953 on the 4th Fine Arts Exhibition the prize of the Ministry of Agriculture was given to him.