New York | Budapest

ALMA ON DOBBIN works with artists in the US and in East-Central Europe who we identify as outstanding in their given art media. We have established partnerships with museums and galleries to present work to the public. Since our formation, we have been organizing several joint exhibitions and events in partnership with our first affiliate institution, the Budapest-based not-for-profit 2B Gallery/Foundation. We are introducing the work of American artists such as Saul Steinberg, Allen Frame, Sylvia Plachy, Allen Ginsberg and Ken Butler to the Hungarian audience, and arranging public events and educational workshops to enhance the understanding and the visibility of contemporary American art in Hungary.

With a goal of fostering international artistic exchange and collaborations, ALMA ON DOBBIN presents exhibitions and free public lectures by Visiting Artists, allowing people to get acquainted with contemporary international art and culture, while also experiencing a work in progress. Our projects will expand and disseminate knowledge of the artists and their works by means of publication and distribution of books, periodicals and exhibition catalogues, as well as on our website.

Upcoming Projects;

• Stolpersteine (2007)
  Stolpersteine (German for "stumbling block") is a project of the artist Gunter Demnig. These memorials are supposed to remind one of the people deported and killed by the Nazis.
  
  Schools, relatives, and various organizationsinvestigate facts about people, who were deported or persecuted during the regime of Nazi Germany. The databank of Yad Vashem, Jerusalem provides more information. Once the investigation work has been done, Demnig manufactures a concrete cube of 10 cm/ 4 in, which he covers with a sheet of brass. Then he adds the writing “Hier wohnte” (Here lived), the name, year of birth and the fate: mostly the date of deportation or death. The Stolperstein is then put down flush in the pavement/sidewalk in front of the last residence of the victim.
  
  2B Gallery invited Demnig to exhibit his work in Budapest. As well, he will install four Stolpersteine on Ráday Street, close by the 2B Gallery. This summer he will travel to six Hungarian cities where he will continue his ongoing project.
  
  
• Chim (2007)
  Alma On Dobbin will mount an exhibition of the world-famous photographer known as Chim, and will be curated by Carole Nagar.
  
  The son of a famous Yiddish printer and publisher, David Szymin, later known as David Seymour “Chim”, he covered many important political events for leading magazines, including Life, beginning with the Spanish Civil War. At the outbreak of World War II he made his way to New York, serving as a photo-interpreter with the U.S. Air Force in Europe.
  
  In 1947, Chim co-founded Magnum, the international photojournalists' cooperative with his friends Robert Capa, Henri-Cartier-Bresson, George Rodger and William Vandivert.
  
  His postwar photographs of the physically and spiritually maimed children of Europe attracted worldwide attention, and were published in a book by UNICEF. The sympathetic and compassionate portraits of these small victims of war led a friend to note that to Chim, wars were an enormous crime against children.
  
  Chim was killed by an Egyptian machine-gunner in 1956, four days after the Armistice at Suez.
  
  
• Uneasiness (2007)
  An exhibition of Japanese contemporary art will open at the 2B Gallery, Budapest, on October 12, 2007. Three artists are living in Japan (Masato Ashitani, Arimichi Iwasawa, Tatsuo Osawa) and three in New York City (Nobuho Nagasawa, Rumi Tsuda, Kazuko Miyamoto). The artists living in Japan are male abstract painters, and those in New York are female scupltors/installation and performance artists. Tsuda and Miyamoto from New York will give performances in the gallery space. This exhibition will run concurrently with the Budapest Autumn Festival.
  
  
• INDIGO Group Book Project (2007)
  A volume about the INDIGO group (INterDIszciplináris GOndolkozás, translated as "interdisciplinary thinking"), who were active in the 1970s and 1980s in Budapest, organized by young artists who were followers of the artist Miklós Erdély. All of them consitiuted the core of underground artists and thinkers in Hungary. Edited by Annamária Szöke. Supported by grants from private donors and Hungarian foundations. In English and Hungarian.
  
  
• Miklós Erdély Book Project (2007)
  A retrospective volume of the great avant-garde artist who worked in many media, including film, installation, painting, conceptualart , poetry, performance art, architecture and writing. Edited by Annamária Szöke. Supported by grants from private donors and Hungarian foundations. In English and Hungarian.
  
  
• Andor Weininger (2008)
  Andor Weininger (Hungarian, 1899-1986) was a student of the Bauhaus whose stage designs were essential to theater experiments at the famous art and design school. Weininger was also a central figure in the legendary Bauhaus Band. Alma On Dobbin is working with writer/architect András Körner, his close friend in New York City, on an enhibition and book/CD project. Körner will lend his Weininger collection to the 2B Gallery, which has never been exhibited. The book will recount personal memories by Weininger on his life during the Bauhaus years and after. The CD will contain Weininger's voice speaking about the Bauhaus Band's history and repertoire, as well as piano instrument and singing.
  
  
• How They Lived (2009)
  A photo exhibition and book by András Körner about the daily lives of Hungarian Jews from the mid-19th Century until the Holocaust. The show will be at the Yivo Institute, New York City, and the 2B Gallery, Budapest.